The Twilight 25 Challenge
by Feisty Y. Beden
Summary: Welcome to The Twilight Twenty-Five, a community that challenges you to churn out, well, twenty-five one-shots &/or drabbles based on predetermined prompts within a three month period.
1. Awkward

**A/N: So I've decided to try this Twilight 25 thing. It may kill me. (Uh, if you don't know, the Twilight 25 is a challenge to write 25 one-shots or "drabbles" [blurbs of exactly 100 words] based on twenty-five one-word prompts. There are details on LJ.)**

**Stephenie Meyer owns everything. I have a chocolate starfish, but please don't punch me in it.  
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**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Awkward**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: M (for language)

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**Awkward**

I woke up, feeling as though I had just gone to sleep. Truthfully, it had been only about three hours since I'd gone to bed, and I'd tossed and turned for most of that time. Perhaps I hadn't been sleeping at all, too giddy to let my mind go to black, to let my body go slack, to drop off the edge of consciousness into another world. The dream world used to be the only place my heart would swell like this, beat in my chest, warm my cheeks, make me flush in my belly and … lower.

But last night.

Oh.

I couldn't wait for college. I was ready to leave behind the sheltered upbringing of Renee and Charlie, to leave small town life and spread my wings and fly. I was so painfully shy, and I was convinced I would never be pretty enough for anyone to overlook my flaws. I didn't look like the other girls, and I certainly didn't party like the other girls. I kept to myself, hiding behind the curtain of my hair as if I were constantly in confessional. "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned." What was my sin? "I have been greedy, wanting passion, love, to be desired, when I should be thankful enough that my body is whole, that I have food and shelter and two protective parents."

And it was true; I mean, what did I have to complain about, in the grand scheme of things? I was healthy. I came from the increasingly rare unbroken home. My parents didn't beat me or put me down or push me to be anything but what I was. But what was that? Who was I? I'd admit, I had some odd habits. I had trouble making conversation. "Small talk" made me panic, get sweaty palms, discover I had a bladder the size of a thimble. During the rare occasion when a boy would actually talk to me, I'd lower my head, whispering behind my confessional screen, addressing my feet. And even then, I'd give monosyllabic answers. No wonder no one ever invited me to parties or asked me to dances. I'm sure my A-cups didn't help. Boys could overlook a lot of flaws if you had nice D-cup jugs. Nope. I had nothing working in my favor.

I heard what the girls would say about me when they didn't realize I was in a bathroom stall while they smoked between periods. "That Bella Swan, she's so _weird_. She's such a freakshow, so clingy. She always listens into our conversations, standing on the edge, like she's _part of it_."

"I _know_. And she laughs at our jokes like she thinks she's our friend or something. As if we'd talk to a loser like that."

I'd wait until the girls cleared out, so they wouldn't know I'd been listening. I'd take out my small memo pad and write down my reported flaws. It was the best way I could understand what I looked like to the outside world. _Don't stand on the edges. Don't laugh if you're not part of the group_, I'd jot down. If the girls dallied until second bell, I'd be late too, but I'd rather subject myself to the stares of my teachers or get an occasional detention than leave myself open to more of the girls' cruel scrutiny.

College was going to be different. I could be anyone I wanted.

It was wonderfully freeing. No one had a past, a reputation that preceded him or her like a damning phantom. We were all mint condition, new out of the box. Of course the super-confident girls were still the super-confident girls with their cutting edge fashion, their saucy, hip-shaking walks, putting on a full face of makeup even for a 9 AM biology class.

But then there were the rest of us, the confused masses. Everyone was friendly that first month of school. We were all in the same boat. A girl approached me at the end of the advanced literature class I'd placed into after my AP scores.

"Hey," she said, offering me her hand. "You're, like, in two other of my classes. Since we're obviously going to be seeing a lot of each other, we should be friends." She smiled widely. "I'm Jessica. Jessica Stanley."

"Oh, hey," I said, fighting my instinct to let my hair fall into my protective veil. It was pulled back into a ponytail anyway. "I'm Bella Swan."

"Bella Swan? That's a pretty name," she said. "Bella Swan, would you like to eat lunch with me?"

And that's how I made my first real friend.

I don't know how I hadn't noticed she lived in my dorm, even on the same floor. You'd think that seeing someone every day in a towel and spitting toothpaste into a sink would make you recognize people, but my problem was that I never really studied faces. I sort of looked _through_ them. I saw people's vague outlines. "That is a girl shape," I'd think. "That is a jock boy shape."

Jessica and I hung out a lot. We had three classes together, and I started saying the stuff out loud to her that floated around in my head. Sometimes they were weird observations or quirks of mine, like how I watched my feet carefully on the sidewalk because a little part of me still wasn't sure I wouldn't break my mother's back if I stepped on a crack. I couldn't live with that kind of guilt.

"You're crazy, Bella," Jessica would laugh, but she said it as if "crazy" were a good thing, a _fun_ thing.

Sometimes I'd give my opinion of what I thought of someone's outfit or hair or choice of arm candy. "That boy's haircut makes him look like the head of a circumcised penis," I once remarked, making Jessica shoot diet Coke out of her nose. "You are _wicked_, and I love you," she'd said once she'd used a paper napkin to blot away most of the damage. "My fucking sinuses, on the other hand, _hate_ you."

I could breathe around Jessica. It was weird. I'd always thought I'd had to hide these little pieces of myself, suck it all in like a potbelly, in order to disappear or be normal or liked. But Jessica loved me because of those weird flabby bits.

It was at dinner one evening after I'd fashioned my salad bar salad into a pretty good likeness of Henry Kissinger that Jessica slammed her hand into the table and said, "Oh my god, you would be so perfect for my friend back home."

"Oh, really?" I asked, pretending not to be too interested. Inside, I was panting, turning cartwheels, thinking, _There's someone out there who might be perfect for meeeeeeee?_

"Yeah," she said, spearing a soggy stalk of broccoli with her fork. "He's my neighbor. I've known him forever. He's got a wacky sense of humor too, and he's just adorable."

"What's his name?" I asked, pretending to be extremely focused on my gummy mashed potatoes.

"Edward," Jessica said, sniffing at her fork and deciding the waterlogged broccoli really wasn't worth it. "He's the cutest thing on earth. I've just known him too long to have the urge to jump his bones. Plus he's a year younger, just a baby. I mean, I saw him in his acne and voice-cracking phase. _You_ know," she said, and I laughed as if I did.

After that dinner, whenever I said anything weird or zany, the more I came out of my shell, Jessica would grab my arm and say, "I'm _telling_ you, Edward is so perfect for you." She said it so much I didn't hear it anymore. I tuned it out the way I stopped noticing the industrial-strength bleach cleanser smell in our dorm. It just smelled like home now. "Edward is so perfect for you" was like an aural wallpaper of home. My college home.

"Bella!" Jessica practically tackled me as I left my sociology class. She was waving a letter in front of me. "Edward's coming to visit for the long weekend!"

"Oh, really?" I said. She'd said his name so much that I didn't think he really existed. He was as real as our school mascot, some sort of plush figure that was supposed to represent a ferocious predator but looked more to me like a purple chipmunk as he danced on the sidelines of the football field.

"Yeah, he's taking the bus, and he's, you know, 'looking at colleges,'" Jessica said, jumping up and down and using air quotes. "Oh, Bella, this is so _perfect_! Finally this will happen! You guys are just going to … fucking _collide_." She put on a deep, manly voice, growling, "_And the world will never be the same_."

"Oh, whatever," I laughed, waving her away. I didn't believe it. Jessica had the tendency to exaggerate. Still, it would be nice to meet her childhood friend.

Columbus Day weekend was strange. I was used to Columbus Day being just an excuse to take the Monday off. In college, Columbus Day meant angry sidewalk chalkings and rallies and marches about the brutal colonization of the Americas. I had no idea. I was so clueless, so sheltered.

Jessica bounced in her dorm room desk chair. "Oh my GOD, I can't wait for that bus to get here!"

"He'll get here, don't worry," I soothed, rolling my eyes playfully. She could be like such a hyperactive puppy.

Finally there was a knock at the door, and she squealed, again, in some range that only puppies could probably hear.

"He's here, omigod omigod omigod!"

"Yay?" I said tentatively.

She opened the door, and there he was, this toned, skinny boy, adorably rumpled from the bus trip. His hair was like rust and bronze and autumn leaves, but I couldn't see his face because he was bent over, fiddling with his suitcases. He stood up finally with a smirk. "Jessica, shit, it's good to see you!" he said, rushing forward, picking her up, and swinging her around.

She laughed and punched him repeatedly in the back. "Cullen, you fucker, put me down!" She straightened her shirt and pointed to me. "So, Culls, this is Bella. You know, _Bella Swan_?" She said it with a little eyebrow wiggle, and I blushed scarlet, knowing she must have talked me up to him as much as she'd been talking him up to me.

"Hey," I whispered, waving at him as stiffly as if I had an oven mitt on.

"Well, it's great to make your acquaintance, _finally_," he said, grinning and grabbing my hand.

It may have been the first time a boy actually touched my hand not by accident.

My heart thudded against my chest, and I looked up at him through my eyelashes. Oh. He was more than cute. He was all hard angles and elbows and messy hair. I found myself wondering what his neck smelled like. I swallowed thickly. I'm sure people across the quad could hear my comically loud gulp.

The three of us were inseparable the whole weekend, going out to eat, having late-night wings, going to the dollar theater and snickering through stilted dialogue and gratuitous boobie shots. It was so easy to talk to Edward. Gosh, I loved just saying "Edward" in my head, even more out loud when I wanted to tell him something. He wore a plaid flannel shirt over his form-fitting t-shirt instead of a sweater, and I was even so bold as to brush my fingers over his homage-to-grunge arm when I wanted to get his attention. I thought I saw his eyes sparkle a little when I did.

It was Sunday night, and Edward was going back home the next morning. "I've got a paper for my psych class," said Jessica. "Why don't you hang out with Bella tonight? I'm going to be so totally boring." She shoved him toward me out in the hallway. "So just go hang out with Bella, and I'll see you on the other side of this paper." She slammed the door in our faces before either of us could protest.

"Well," I said, shrugging.

"Yeah." He coughed, kicking his feet a little.

We hadn't been alone together this whole time, and I felt tiny threads, little strands of spider's silk connecting us. I wanted to touch his arm, but I had no reason. I put my hand in my pocket.

"So you want to go to my room?" I managed to choke out.

"Sure," he nodded, following me.

We sat on my bed, and he looked at the stuff on my walls. "There aren't a lot of photos of you in high school," he remarked.

"Yeah, it kind of wasn't awesome," I said, swinging my legs like a kid.

"I like high school," he said, almost with guilt.

"Sure, it's good for some people. I'm just … I wasn't too comfortable there. No one wanted to see who I was."

"I have trouble believing that," he said, picking up a little ballerina figurine on the shelf.

"Oh, that thing. I'm pretty much the clumsiest thing on earth, but I do have a sick fascination with ballet."

He exhaled on the figurine, carefully rubbing the dust off with his shirttail, never taking his eyes off of me.

"What's high school like for you?" I asked, curious about positive high school experiences.

"Dunno," he shrugged. "Classes, pranks, video games. Books. Friends. Sometimes I bake muffins."

"Are you serious? Muffins?"

"You'd be surprised how a good muffin can make a homeroom teacher overlook your lateness."

"That sounds like a euphemism," I chuckled.

"I'm no season one Pacey," he said, mock-offended.

My cheeks flushed. I wasn't even sure why.

"You have the most amazing blush," he said, which did nothing to alleviate the deep crimson shade I'd turned.

"God, it's totally embarrassing," I giggled nervously.

"You're, like, hypercolor." He reached up tentatively to touch my cheek. I shivered.

"How do you even know what hypercolor is? You weren't even conceived the last time hypercolor was out."

"And you were probably in utero. Anyway, I've seen, like, every 'I Love the 80s' on VH-1. I know shit."

We talked about everything and nothing, and only my dry, droopy eyelids gave me any indication of how much time had gone by. I yawned hugely and glanced at my watch.

"Oh, holy crow, it's after 5 AM!" I shouted.

"Dude. Seriously. Dude," said Edward, snickering. "Did you really just say 'holy crow'? What are you, Amish?"

I blushed more. "I … uh, I don't swear a lot. My parents, you know. They kind of are, you know, _sensitive_."

"Come on, let it out," he said, taking my hand in his. Oh god. Butterflies somersaulted in my stomach. Butterflies somersaulted in the stomachs of the butterflies somersaulting in my stomach.

"What are you suggesting?" I asked, wide-eyed.

"Come on, say, oh I don't know … how about 'Jesus Tittyfucker Cocksucking Monkeyfucking Buttlicker Chocolate Starfish'?"

"Uhhhh," I said.

"Come _on_," he said, nudging me with his shoulder.

"Jesus … _Tittyfu—_oh I just can't," I said, hiding my face in my hands and laughing until I was doubled over in pain.

"I'll write it out for you," he said, taking a Sharpie from the can of pens on my desk and a piece of notebook paper. He wrote the unthinkable words in artistic, block letters, slanting slightly to the left. The room smelled of permanent marker.

"Here, pretend you're reading the news. I'm the teleprompter." He held up the notebook paper.

"Coming up, our top stories," I began in a goofy television anchorman voice, "Jesus Tittyfucker Cocksucking Monkeyfucking Buttlicker Chocolate Starfish in interview with Barbara Walters."

Edward dropped the paper, whooping and raising his arms triumphantly, as if I'd made a touchdown.

"Now, wasn't that _freeing_?"

"I … I don't _know_," I said and clapped my hands over my mouth. "I feel so _dirty_," I said, mumbling behind my hands. "I should probably wash my mouth out with soap or something."

"Or not," Edward said, as he leaned closer, grabbing my face and kissing me hard. Oh. Oh my gosh. I was frozen. I had no idea what I was supposed to do. My lips were like stone. He laid a few gentle kisses on my lips until I turned to jelly, and my mouth opened just so I could breathe. He dragged his tongue across my lower lip, then grabbed my lip between his teeth and raked them across slowly. I moaned both in fear and _holy crow my insides are combusting_.

He pulled away. "I'm sorry—was that too bold?"

"Monkeyfucking Buttlicker?" was all I could say out loud. I clapped my hands over my mouth again.

He laughed. "You, Bella Swan, are the most motherfucking adorable thing ever." And he kissed me again, softly.

"What are we supposed to do now?" I asked.

"Look out your window—the sun is rising. Isn't it beautiful?" We both turned and looked, but the pinks and purples of the fall sunrise did nothing to calm my fluttering heart.

He turned me so I was leaning against him, and we just gazed out the window in silence as the sun rose, ruby red, the skies perfectly clear in that way it is only in the fall, before winter's bite returns.

"I'd better get back," he finally said. "Jessica will wonder where I am."

"No, she won't," I laughed, and he stood up, straightening his flannel shirt.

"What time is your bus?" I asked.

"A little before noon."

"Okay," I said, yawning again, "I'll come by to say goodbye." He gave me a bone-crushing hug, kissed my forehead, and slipped out the door.

So here I was lying in bed, barely rested. No, not rested at all. I looked at my watch in panic. It was 10 AM. He probably hadn't left yet.

I brushed my hair, changed my clothes, and tried to wipe the sleep from my eyes. I didn't even bother putting on my shoes. I bolted out the door barefoot and banged on Jessica's door.

Jessica opened the door so quickly that I nearly knocked on her forehead. "Hey, you!" she said brightly.

"How did your paper go?" I looked past her shoulder to see Edward. His back was to me as he crammed the last of his belongings into his suitcases.

"Eh, it's done. Freud had issues," she said, rolling her eyes.

I wasn't sure if Edward's kisses were somehow visible on my face, but Jessica didn't seem to notice. Edward finally turned toward me, and I smiled hugely, nearly hurting my cheeks. He gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head, and his eyes looked scared.

I realized he was afraid I was going to say something to Jessica about last night. I … I would have been okay, I think, if he didn't want to try anything long-distance—after all, we'd known each other only for about three days. But there was something, something about that fear and shame in his eyes that deadened my heart. I was reminded of the beginning of _Howard's End_, when Helen explains to her sister why she quickly got engaged to Paul Wilcox, and as quickly broke off the engagement, all within about twenty-four hours' time. She says to her sister of the morning after the engagement: "I was still happy while I dressed, but as I came downstairs I got nervous, and when I went into the dining-room I knew it was no good…. Charles was talking to [Paul] about Stocks and Shares, and he looked frightened….

"Somehow, when that kind of man looks frightened it is too awful. It is all right for us to be frightened, or for men of another sort—Father, for instance; but for men like that! When I saw all the others so placid, and Paul mad with terror in case I said the wrong thing, I felt for a moment that the whole Wilcox family was a fraud, just a wall of newspapers and motor-cars and golf-clubs, and that if it fell I should find nothing behind it but panic and emptiness." [1]

I saw that same terror in Edward's eyes, and I knew that maybe what we'd done a few hours ago was something that he never wanted Jessica to know, for whatever reason.

"Hey," I said, trying to show it was no big thing. "So, are you going to come back to visit us?"

He shrugged. "Yeah, I have to check with my schedule and my dad and all."

"Well, it was very nice to meet you," I said, spreading my arms wide for a goodbye hug. He walked to me and shook my hand, clapping his other hand on my back as if I were some dude friend of his. My heart crumpled like tissue paper in his fist, but I kept a smile on my face.

Jessica helped Edward take his suitcases down to the entrance where the cab waited to take him back to the bus station. In a few moments she was back at her room. We both stood looking out the window, leaning our hands on the windowsill, our foreheads pressed against the cold glass. Our breath fogged the panes slightly, but we still could make out the cab taking Edward back home.

"You know," she said, "I think I changed my mind. I think I want Edward again."

"It happens," I said noncommittally, thinking to myself another line from _Howard's End_:

"To Helen, at all events, her life was to bring nothing more intense than the embrace of this boy who played no part in it." [2]

"See ya," I said to Jessica as I crept back to my room, looking for the sheet of notebook paper to make sure I hadn't dreamed it. The paper was there, and I touched my fingertip tentatively to my ballerina figurine, realizing that the statuette probably knew better than I what Edward Cullen smelled like.

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[1] E.M. Forster, _Howard's End_ (New York: Signet Classic, 1986), 21.

[2] Ibid, 20.

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**Please review!**

**Also forgot to say ****I've signed up for the Support Stacie author auction! See my profile for link location and bidding info and such.  
**


	2. Erosion

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Erosion**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: T**

**Stephenie Meyer owns this, even if I never use the words "Edward" or "Cullen."**

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Erosion**

He had entered the garden again, as he did whenever he felt pulled, even if he were on the other side of the world. The city names changed from time to time, and houses sprang up like mushrooms after the rain, only to disappear again in the blink of an eye. He waited in the shadows, checking for bystanders. He stood perfectly, impossibly still, "like a marble statue," she'd always said. Even though it was so long ago, he remembered her timid voice, her surprisingly husky laugh.

He had wanted her to see herself the way he did, so she consented to let him carve her likeness in granite. He didn't need her to sit for him; her face and her delicate body were burned onto him like a brand, marking him as her possession. She was all he ever saw. All he had to do was chip away all the parts of the slab that were not of her. It was easy, really.

When she looked at the finished work, she laughed self-deprecatingly. "You've made me too perfect. You have created an angel. And I," she said, looking slyly at him out of the corner of her eye, "am no angel."

"This is your true face," he'd insisted.

"My true face? My darling, how can you see so much and yet so little? That statue is perfection, but its utter perfection _is_ its flaw. I have crooked teeth and shadows under my eyes, and you have not reflected any of that in this Venus."

"But this is how I see you," he had said, stroking her face gently, his hand still covered in granite dust. She had no idea how much control it took for him, how he never could truly touch her. It was as in séances from his dimly remembered youth, when hands would hover over hands, never touching, stopping just when the life energy between the palms would create almost a magnetic barrier, two north poles repelling each other. That's what it was like to caress her. He had to stop when he felt her warm blood radiating through the delicate membrane of her skin, not hard like marble, but alive, soft, fragile.

"I've marred you," he'd said, looking at the dust he had left on her cheek. He offered her his handkerchief, but she just laughed that throaty laugh again.

"Don't be ridiculous," she'd said, rubbing her palm roughly against her cheek, bringing a blush to it like a shine on an apple. "All clean," she smiled bewitchingly.

She hadn't wanted to keep the statue—"Nowhere to keep it," she'd said as an excuse. "I do love it though, darling."

"We'll leave it in my parents' garden, then," he'd said, and she'd nodded at his sensible plan.

He approached the statue from the back, creeping up to it like a common thief or vandal. The grounds were long overgrown, wild, the gates rusted, corroding. His family hadn't lived here in centuries. There were rumors in town that these old ruins were haunted. As he saw the stone glowing red in the sunset, he was reminded of the highlights in her hair. He remembered it as if it were only a breath ago, but of course he had no need to breathe.

How quickly the fire had gone out of her hair! The hoarfrost appeared seemingly overnight, marking her autumn, her winter.

"Stay with me," he had begged. "Let me give you lasting life." But she laughed that same throaty laugh as always.

"I am an ebbing tide," she said. "How foolish I would look by your side now, a cobwebby shawl draped on an Adonis. It would be such a waste." Her voice sounded like ice crackling on the surface of a pond, but her laugh still was lively and young.

"You look unchanged to me," he said, even as she seemed to shrink and wither before his eyes. "You are still my Venus."

"And you, darling, are a silly boy. But I do love you."

He was holding her in his arms when she slipped out of her shell like smoke swirling from a lit stick of incense. He had felt her leave her body, that magnetic field finally shut off. Her body was suddenly like lead though she had felt no heavier than a feather when she drew shallow breath moments before. After all those years of restraint he finally could feel her skin against his, but he hadn't expected it to feel so cold. There was no barrier between them now, no need to be careful, no need to stop his hand when he felt the forcefield telling him to go no farther if he cherished her life.

There was no forcefield, just marble against ice.

Standing in the old garden now, he closed his eyes and stepped around the statue, savoring the moment when he would see the only version of immortality he had been able to give his beloved. He could still see her face burned there behind his marble eyelids, that perfect, glowing vision, his Venus.

He opened his eyes and took a step back in shock. Had it been so long? Her features were weathered away by wind, rain, the unstoppable turning of the wheel of time. The perfect teeth he had carved were now chipped; small bits of stone had crumbled away from beneath her soulful eyes, leaving them hollow, haunted.

Finally he could see her the way she had seen herself; finally he understood that he was, indeed, the foolish one. It was so obvious now. Her flaws were what had made her so perfect—how could he not have seen it then? He had wanted her to see herself through his eyes, but he was the one who never truly saw her. He drew his hand up to touch the statue's cheek, changing his mind at the last second, shuddering at the memory of marble on ice. No, he would memorize _this_ face with the cracks and chips and moss, but always remember the old feeling of _almost touching_, the warm forcefield forbidding them to make true contact. "I think I understand now, Bella," he said as he turned on his heel and left the garden, unsure when—or if—he would return.

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**A/N: I promise that some of these will be funny and/or happy. Also, I'm signed up as an author in the Support Stacie auction—see link in my profile if you want to make me your writing bitch.**


	3. Crave

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Crave**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: T**

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Crave**

"Edward! Eeeeeeedwaaaaaaaard!"

God-fucking-dammit. Even though I didn't need sleep, that voice going off at all hours of the day was starting to get to me.

"Yes, my darling?" I said, rubbing imaginary sleep out of my eyes.

"Gordita. Hot sauce. Pint of butter pecan. And I want O-positive. Now! Now!"

"Yes, love," I said, fetching the keys to my Volvo.

I left her sitting on the couch under the food-splattered afghan, slurping at the dregs of A-negative and O-negative in her Foam Dome hat.

Taco Bell, then food mart. Then break into blood bank.

"And pizza rolls!"

Fuck my life.


	4. Play

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Play**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella (but really is about Bella & Charlie)**

**Rating: M (for language)**

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Play**

"I need more socks. Where the fuck are all my socks?"

"Bella, you're a vampire. Why do you need socks?" Edward asked gently, searching my eyes for signs of the old craziness.

"I can't tell you, Edward. You'll spoil the surprise." I pulled back, resenting how delicately everyone treated me. Rationally, I understood their caution, but I was over it. I was ready to move on, and I didn't want to be reminded. I wanted it all to be in the past. The forgotten past.

"Me? Spoil?" He sounded offended. "My mind is like Fort Knox."

"Please, Edward—do you remember how easy it was to crack you open like a nut about the whole _ampire-vay_ thing? All it took was me getting sort-of-almost-attacked in Port Angeles, and you folded like a cheap hooker punched in the gut."

Behind me, I heard snickering. "You said 'crack.' And 'nut.' And 'cheap hooker.'"

"Yes, Emmett, yes I did," I said, rolling my eyes. I kind of walked into that one. "Are you going to giggle like a schoolgirl at double entendres all day, or are you going to help me find socks, you big lug?"

"Can't I do both?" Emmett pouted.

"Of course. Now help me find some fucking socks."

"Any socks? Or special _fucking_ socks?" Emmett asked with an impish grin.

"Holy Christ. Dude. It's not always about your wang."

"I beg to differ," Emmett sniffed, but he smiled at our old, familiar banter.

Emmett and I went from room to room in the big Cullen manse. It was true; vampires didn't really need socks. Our feet didn't chafe, obviously. We wore out shoes faster with our big granite feet than I guess the twelve dancing princesses from that fairy tale. And we certainly didn't need them to keep warm. I didn't even know why Esme bothered doing the laundry. It wasn't as if vampires sweat or anything. But she insisted—maybe it helped her feel normal, domestic.

It would be far less annoying if she didn't also do that human thing of losing one out of nearly every pair of socks that went in the wash. And damn it, I needed socks today.

We went into the room Emmett and Rosalie shared, and Emmett pulled a few socks out from under the extremely sturdy bed. "Uh, Bella, do the socks need to, you know, bend?" he asked as he held out a tube sock that was glittering and kind of crusty.

"You are so disgusting, Emmett. Of course it needs to bend. Ew. I don't even … ugh. No. Just … no. Put that away. Let us never speak of this again."

Emmett kicked the spunk-petrified socks back under the bed. "We're all adults here, Bella," he said.

"Uh-huh," I said, looking at him pointedly.

He ignored me and turned around. "Oh, oh look, now what could this be?" Emmett asked, foraging around the top drawer of his bureau.

"Please, Emmett. My eyes. Don't make me go blind again. I still haven't recovered from that chin strap-on thing with the … oh god, don't make me say it out loud." If I could still blush, I would have been crimson all over.

"Bella, it's not _always_ about you, you know," said Emmett, waving a plastic packet at me—a new jumbo pack of socks.

"Oh, Em, I love you! Thanks! I can do whatever I want with these?"

Emmett opened his mouth with a devilish look on his face.

"Don't say it," I warned.

"You're no fun," he said, crossing his arms over the package of socks.

I sidled up to him and gave him a big hug. "You know I love you, right, big bro? I tease because I love."

"Yeah, yeah." He handed me the socks, and I stood on my tiptoes so I could peck him on the cheek.

"Thanks, sweetcheeks," I said, giving him a playful pat on the ass.

"Bella, it's nice to have you, you know, _back_," he said, running his hand through his hair a little nervously.

I shrugged it off. I didn't want to talk about it. Why did he have to acknowledge it? Why couldn't they just let me pretend? "Whatever," I said, crushing the package of socks in my hands.

"Are you going to tell me what they're for?" he called as I dashed toward to Esme's craft room.

"You'll see."

***

"Can I look yet, Daddy?"

"No, hon. You keep those eyes closed."

"Okay, Daddy." I was in Forks for the summer to visit Charlie. We always had a day or two of shyness, of getting to know the other again. It was hard to remember how we were supposed to talk to each other. _This is my daddy_, I had to remind myself. I always felt a little proud about flying on the plane all by myself. Well, those nice ladies in the smart uniforms helped me and took me by the hand from gate to gate, but still, I sat in that seat all by myself, swinging my legs. Maybe sometimes they had to help me buckle my seatbelt. But other than that, I was in-de-pen-dent (I thought that was the big word my teacher used). Oh yes, and they'd walk me to the bathroom in the back, and sometimes help me with flushing, because the airplane toilet made such a scary sound, like it wanted to suck my bottom out of the plane along with my tinkles.

But other than that, I was all grown up. All six years old and grown up and visiting my daddy, who was a tough policeman.

The kids in school thought it was cool that I was the daughter of a policeman. Half the kids wanted to be policemen or firemen anyway. Some of the meaner kids didn't think my dad was really a cop. They thought I was lying, that I didn't have a daddy. But if they said that out loud at recess, I'd punch them in the face. "I do SO have a daddy!" I'd say, fists flailing.

I got sent to the principal's office a few times, but Mommy didn't seem too upset. She liked that I could stand up for myself. "You're strong, Bella. A strong girl. You know what you want, and you'll fight for it."

I wished Mommy and Daddy could live together, but it was also nice to have both of them happy. Mommy was so much smilier now, no more crying with the door shut. She thought I couldn't tell what was happening in there, but I knew. When Mommy cried, I could feel it in my heart, like someone was squeezing it hard. And now I got special Daddy time too. It was only in the summer, but it was our time and ours alone.

Still, I hated all this waiting. "Can I look _now_, Daddy?"

"Where's the fire, kid? You got someplace better to be?" Daddy was using his tough-guy voice. I bet he used that voice when he was going after the bad men.

"You don't scare me," I said, jutting my jaw out.

"Okay on three: one, two, three!"

***

"Fucking piece of shit needles!" I swore under my breath. Another needle had snapped in half when I stuck it through the sock and right against my unyielding thumb. In the old days, I'd have pierced myself and maybe grown faint at the sight of my bleeding thumb. But a tiny sewing needle was no match for my impenetrable vampire skin. I thought I was supposed to be more graceful now that I'd been changed. Well, I guessed that was sort of true—I certainly didn't trip as often as I used to, or if I did, I finished with a somersault or back handspring and made it look like I'd meant to do it. But I hadn't gained any special fine motor-control skills. I thought back to nearly flunking home ec back in Phoenix. I probably would have done better in shop.

On second thought, being around those whirring saws and nail guns … I might not have survived to move up to Forks after Renee married Phil. No way. Or I'd be Stumpy McSwan, with stubs for hands.

Could vampires get cricks in their necks? I'd been hunched over this stupid sock for so long, staring these misbehaving buttons, trying to sew the things on. Why hadn't I just used glue?

_Because that's not how this is done_, I thought, answering my own question. There was a right way and a wrong way.

I tried to think back about thirty years, tried to imagine someone else hunched over like this, probably swearing up a storm too. I got a little lump in my throat, and my hand trembled a little as I tried to thread another needle. I was going to have to go to Michael's or wherever to buy Esme new needles. I must already have gone through a whole pack of them, little glints of silver on the ground around me, like magic pine needles in a mystical forest.

***

"Where are you going, little girl?"

I giggled at my daddy's gruff voice, muffled by the cardboard box he huddled behind, his makeshift stage.

"I'm going to my grandma's house!" he answered himself in a ridiculous falsetto.

I chortled and clapped my hands. He'd put these silly things on his hands that were supposed to be Red Riding Hood and the wolf.

"Don't talk to the wolf!" I cried out. "He's trying to trick you!"

Red Riding Hood looked at me with her button eyes and said, "You're a big, smart little girl! But I am going to talk to the wolf. You can't stop me." She turned to the wolf and said, "My grandma's house is down this lane. Oh look, butterflies!" And Red Riding Hood disappeared behind the box.

"Mwah ha ha ha," said the wolf, the sun in the backyard glinting off his button eyes. "I'm going to run as fast as I can to her granny's house."

"Boo!" I yelled. "You are a naughty wolf!"

"Who asked you?"

"I asked me!" I said, my hands on my hips.

"Mwah ha ha ha," the wolf said again. My daddy brought his other hand up, now naked, and twirled the mustache on the wolf sock.

"Daddy!" I cried out. "Why did you give the wolf your mustache?"

"Pay no attention to the man behind the box," said the wolf sternly.

"You leave that nice Red Riding Hood alone," I said, my hands clenched into fists.

"Little girl in the audience," said the wolf sock, "you can't change the story. The story that's already been told is the one we've got to follow."

***

I finally got those stupid buttons on. Both the socks looked lazy-eyed. I tried to think of Charlie sewing his own version of these. Had he done them himself? My human memories were blurry, an almost-forgotten dream, like remembering a smell but not knowing from where. Come to think of it, I think I must have seen Charlie bent over and swearing, sewing a button back on his oxford shirt. His thumbs were calloused, brawny man's hands. I chuckled a little to myself thinking that some of the toughness came from stabbing himself with needles. _I am my father's daughter_, I thought as I reached for the bright red headscarf I'd stolen from Alice's closet.

***

"It's a trap! It's a trap!" I cried out, getting up on my legs and jumping up and down. "Don't go in, Red Riding Hood! That's not Granny!"

"Ahem. Excuse me, big little girl who is being rather noisy, but I have to go in."

"Why?" I pleaded. I liked this sock a lot. I wanted to protect her from the mustache sock.

I don't know how my daddy made the Red Riding Hood sock sigh, but he did. "Sometimes bad things happen. But it's going to be okay. I'll be just fine. Do you trust me, big little girl?"

"I trust _you_," I said. "It's that other sock I don't trust."

"Sock? What is this about socks? I am a little girl," said Red Riding Hood, straightening her sock-self up to full arm's height. She knocked on Granny's door with her entire head.

"Come in!" said the wolf sock in my daddy's voice pretending to be a wolf pretending to be the other sock's granny.

***

He'd found me crumpled to the floor, curled up in a little ball. I heard him, _felt_ him run into the room. He tried to comfort me. "You knew this would happen someday, Bella," Edward said, rubbing my back.

"I know. But it wasn't supposed to be so _soon_," I said into the carpet.

"I'm so sorry, darling. It's always too soon."

I wished I remembered how to cry, but instead I went for a long run through the woods, branches catching in my hair. I ran barefoot, feeling wild and free. I ran until I almost forgot the news. Edward didn't go with me. He knew I needed to be alone.

I wondered what it had been like for him, waking up with Carlisle for the first time. Did he remember? Did he know who he was missing?

***

"My, what big ears you have!" said Red Riding Hood.

"It's the wolf! It's the wolf!" I shouted.

"Wolf?" said Red Riding Hood, button eyes on me again. "I don't see a wolf. I see my granny. And my granny is sick. She needs her sweet Little Red to comfort her."

"That's not your granny!" I knew it was just a play, but it still made me nervous.

"I'm her granny," said the wolf in his mustache and the granny hat. I think Daddy had borrowed the hat from my baby doll.

"You are _not_ her granny."

"Yes, I am."

"No, you're not."

"I am. Little Red, ask me anything."

The red-hooded sock bounced over to the mustached sock. "Why do they call me 'Little Red Riding Hood'?"

"Because you always wear that little red riding hood," answered the wolf sock.

"You're right!" said the Red Riding Hood sock. "Do you believe Granny now, big little girl?"

"_Everybody_ knows that's why you're called 'Little Red Riding Hood,'" I said, rolling my eyes.

"Do you want us to stop the show?" asked Little Red.

I thought for a minute. I was coming up with a plan. "No," I said. "I'll be quiet now."

***

Forks was a sleepy town. Aside from the, you know, vampires and werewolves running around, it was completely ordinary. Just the usual silly things: teenage vandals, graffiti, mailbox baseball, Halloween toilet-papering and egging. So when Charlie followed up on a call about suspicious behavior at the big foreclosed house a street or two down from his, he was expecting some kids smoking pot or having sex.

He'd surprised them.

And they surprised him right back.

***

"My, what big teeth you have," said Red Riding Hood.

True to my word, I'd been quiet. "Silent as the grave," as my mommy would say when she wanted me to be quiet so she could watch her stories. But I was ready with my plan.

"The better to EAT YOU WITH, MY DEAR!" growled my daddy as the wolf. But I was ready.

I crept up to the cardboard box on my hands and knees and grabbed the wolf sock by his ears, tugging as hard as I could.

"Hey!" shouted Daddy, just being Daddy. I'd surprised him.

I pulled the wolf sock off and threw him on the ground. "You will _not_ hurt Little Red Riding Hood!" I said. I had him pinned under a stick. "You are under arrest. You have the right to read _Maine Siren_. Anything you say can be used against you in a cord of log." I'd heard Daddy say the … rights … I forgot exactly, but they were named for some lady. Melissa? Melinda Rights? I wasn't sure what the _Maine Siren_ was, but it sounded like a pretty cool book, if they let criminals read it.

"Hey!" shouted Daddy again, but this time he was trying to be Red Riding Hood. "That's not how the story goes!" He was laughing though.

"Nobody is going to hurt you," I said. "This wolf is going to jail."

He came out from behind the cardboard box. His knees were wet from kneeling on the muddy grass for so long. He picked me up and twirled me around and around. "I love you, baby girl. You're so brave."

"Nobody hurts Little Red," I said. "Even if it's only pretend."

***

They were just kids, in the end, but they were scared and surprised. I don't think they'd meant to shoot him. I think they were just scared, and maybe someone's finger slipped. At least, that's what Edward told me when he went by the station to see them. He knew I needed to know.

"They weren't trying to kill him," he'd said when he came back. I wanted to go, but everyone thought it would be a bad idea.

"I know you want to see their faces, to understand who it was who took Charlie away, but you know we can't let you," Carlisle had said.

Deep down I'd known he was right, but I'd been resentful. I knew I would have been a danger, that if I'd seen those little punks, I would have ripped the heads right off their bodies. _An accident_, Edward kept trying to tell me, as if somehow that made it better, easier.

_It would have happened someday_.

Yeah, of course I knew that. But I thought Charlie would be old and frail, not still bursting with life and jollity and bad puns and silly surprises for Renesmee. She'd still laughed every time he pulled a quarter out from behind her ear.

It had taken me years to forgive Carlisle, even to speak to him again. Maybe ten years. I couldn't remember. For a while I wouldn't even let Renesmee touch my face, because I couldn't bear for her to know what I saw in my head, for her to feel even an ounce of the pain that went through me every minute, missing my father.

But deep down, I knew I couldn't bear to see _her_ thoughts, her memories of her sweet, doting grandfather.

I tried to be as good a mom as I could. _It would have happened someday. So why be so upset? _

Maybe because I thought it somehow wouldn't happen to me. My whole life had been a series of impossibilities. Vampires shouldn't exist, but I'd found them. Vampires weren't supposed to fall in love with fragile humans, and yet Edward had with me. And now I was never going to die. I was supposed to be ravenous and crazy for the first few years after I'd been changed, but it had been easy, so easy.

I guessed I figured everything would be like that. That maybe I'd be exempt from the pain.

_It would have happened someday_.

Yeah, but not for me. I was special, or so I'd thought. I wasn't going to have to give up anything. I'd have it all, the fairytale ending. Happily ever after.

The problem with "happily ever after" is that time keeps going, even when you decide to close the book.

***

"Darling, can you come to the backyard?" I called for Renesmee. She still looked like a child. She would always be my baby.

"Yes, Mama."

I was so thankful she hadn't withdrawn during my years of mourning. I had tried to smile as much as I could, to make up for the fact that I wouldn't let her touch me, but she must have known. My smiles at her weren't lies. She was sunshine to me, and I could still see Charlie in her eyes. That was the sad part of my smile, loving her and missing him all at once. Too many emotions.

I didn't even remember what had made me remember the puppet show. Maybe it was seeing the big box that the new TV had come in, Esme's sewing kit open, buttons spilling out—Emmett was always busting through his clothes like the Hulk.

I set up the big box outside on the damp grass. "Now, you sit over there," I said. I'd laid out a few newspapers so she wouldn't get wet.

"Okay, Mama."

"Now, close your eyes," I said, crouching behind the box. "Are they closed?"

"Yes, Mama."

"Are you sure?" I asked teasingly.

"Of course, Mama. You know I can't lie to you."

This was true.

"All right." I put a sock on my right hand, then the other on my left. It was trickier than I'd thought it would be. How had Charlie done this? I had to pull the second sock on with my teeth.

"Can I look _now_, Mama?"

"Not yet," I said, the sock still in my teeth. "Almost."

"Now?"

"Okay, _now_." I popped my arm up behind the cardboard box. "Hi! Do you like my fancy red cape? Do you know my name?" I said in a high, girlish voice.

"Little Red Riding Hood!" cried Renesmee, clapping her little hands together.

I brought my other arm up. "And who am I?" I said in a deep, gruff voice.

"Grandpa Charlie!" Renesmee cheered.

Oh no. That wasn't right. I looked up at my arm from where I crouched, the mustache on the big bad wolf just like Charlie's wolf from a puppet show a lifetime ago.

"Why do you have Jacob ears, Grandpa Charlie?" asked Renesmee.

"All the … better to hear you with?" I said, my voice faltering.

"Silly Grandpa," said Renesmee. "I know you can hear me just fine. You don't need funny Jacob ears."

"Uh … oh yes, of course," I said. "One moment." I brought the wolf puppet down and ripped the ears off with my teeth, the ears that had taken three hours and a dozen needles to sew on. Gone in one moment, tiny holes in the toe of Emmett's sock.

"I'm back!" I said, popping the puppet back up.

"Grandpa Charlie!" clapped Renesmee. "I miss you."

"I … I miss you too," I said, trying to remember the cadence of my father's voice.

"But I know you're here," she said. "All the time, with me, right?"

"Of course, my little bumblebee." I tried to keep my voice steady. I wanted to shield Renesmee from all this grief.

I brought Little Red back up behind the box. "What's going on here?" I made Little Red ask cheerily.

"I'm just talking to my Grandpa Charlie," said Renesmee. "Do you want to meet him? He's ever so nice. He hides most of the time, but I still see him. Today he is a sock."

"That's Chief Sock to you," I said, and Renesmee giggled.

"What story are you going to tell me?" she asked.

"Whatever you want, sweetheart. You can choose."

"Can you tell me the story about the little girl and the mustache grandpa and the robots and the ballerinas from space?"

"Of course, sweetheart," I said in my best Charlie voice, and I could swear I could smell his aftershave as I began, making it up as I went along.

**

* * *

A/N: Please be kind, rewind. I mean, review. So this one was not so happy. I just wanted Fats to rub up against me.**


	5. Heart

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Heart**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: M (for language)**

**Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns, etc., disclaimers boring; I like rain; I like ham; I like you.**

**

* * *

Heart**

I couldn't decide if fate had been cruel or kind when I'd been assigned to share a lab bench with Edward Cullen. I thought he couldn't stand me, the way he'd look at me over his bio book, crinkling his nose as if I smelled bad.

I had never breathed a word of it to anyone, how the sight of him sent my heart pounding against my ribs, the blood rushing to my face. It was just one of those things. But Jessica had seen me look after him as he passed us by the lockers, and she'd guessed. "You totally want him," she'd said, poking me in the shoulder with her bony finger.

"Ow!" I complained, rubbing my shoulder. "Who? What?" I pretended to be confused.

"Please," she said, rolling her eyes. "Don't embarrass us both by pretending you don't totally want to jump Edward Cullen's bones."

"Gah!" I shouted, clamping my hand over her mouth. "Someone might hear you! Jesus!"

Jessica did what she usually did when I tried to get her to shut up in this manner: she stuck her tongue out, licking my palm.

"You are so disgusting," I said, making a face and wiping my hand on my jeans.

She just shrugged. "You're just now figuring that out? And, ew, why do you taste like ham?"

"You can't tell anyone," I begged. "I'd die. I'd just die of embarrassment."

"You are such a child," she said, but not unkindly. I think I fascinated her, like she was watching a National Geographic special on the mating habits of the emotionally stunted. "You have to go out there and _live_, woman! Carpe diem!"

"Were you watching _Dead Poets_ again?" She kind of watched that movie a lot.

"What? Those private school boys are so hot."

"That movie is _ancient_," I said. "Those private school boys are developing rheumatoid arthritis and being screened for prostate cancer. Maybe getting regular colonoscopies."

"La la la la la la la," said Jessica with her fingers in her ears. "La la la, I'd still hit that, la la!"

I opened my locker, getting books for the next class and sneaking a handful of goldfish crackers.

"It's your lucky day, Bella," said Jessica, grabbing a few goldfish out of my hand. She popped them into her mouth, chewing sloppily. "I'm going to help you. I'm going to help you land Edward Cullen."

"You make him sound like the New World."

"What the fuck's that supposed to mean?" Jessica didn't pay too much attention in class. She kind of … well she kind of whored around. But it was cool. She was fascinating to me too. I made sure not to share drinks with her, though, pretty sure that her mouth was a breeding ground for mono. I wasn't about to have my spleen get all enlarged without some good macking beforehand. To get mono from sharing a Coke? Lame. Total lamesauce.

"Never mind," I said, slamming my locker shut. "How can you possibly help me 'land' Edward Cullen?" I glanced over my shoulder to see if anyone had overheard us.

"You'll see," she said, winking. "I know things. Schedules, social calendars. Just let me put some feelers out."

"Why would you do this?" I narrowed my eyes, suspicious. "Did you make a bet with someone? Is this like some _She's All That_ shit? Because I don't even have glasses to take off and become suddenly sexy."

"Bella, my love, I just want to see you happy. And getting laid. Or something. Some close approximation of laid-getting. I would do it for free. I sound my barbaric yawp!"

"Prostate cancer," I reminded her, and she blew me a raspberry.

***

True to her word, a few days later she grabbed me in the hallway before homeroom to tell me that Edward Cullen would be at Tyler Crowley's party the coming weekend. "Am I even invited?" I asked. I didn't often get invited to things. I was somewhat invisible, and the people who did see me didn't speak to me because I hung out with the school slut. It was strange. Jessica was obviously popular with the guys, but the girls didn't want anything to do with her. And in school, the guys only talked to her to make lewd comments or preplan their booty calls.

I may have been her only real friend.

"Well, virginpants, this isn't exactly the engraved-invitation-and-RSVP-card kind of party," she said, sliding down the lockers until she was sitting on her ass on the linoleum tile. She had mismatched striped socks on today with her ironically retro froofy 80s miniskirt. "Crowley's parents are out of town. It's one of _those_ parties."

"Oh," I exhaled. I wasn't sure I was allowed to go to _those_ kinds of parties. My dad was the police chief, and god help me if he ever found me at any party with alcohol.

Jessica read the look on my face and rolled her eyes. "Do _not_ worry about Charlie. Just tell him you're spending the night at my house." I didn't really have the heart to tell her that I wasn't really supposed to hang out with her either. He thought she was a bad seed.

"I don't know …" I tried to think of a plausible excuse, but my brain wasn't functioning properly.

"Bella, I'm not taking no for an answer. _He_ is going to be there. You are going to be there. There will be laid-getting. Trust me on this."

Grasping for straws, I said, "I don't have anything to wear," looking down at my plaid flannel shirt.

"I'm _on it_, Bella, jeez," Jessica said. "I'm not sending you to the wolves dressed like Kurt Cobain circa 1993."

When I sat next to Edward Cullen in bio that afternoon, my heart was beating so loudly that I was certain he could hear it. All through the period my hands were clammy, leaving sticky handprints on the black lab table. As the class bell rang and students began to gather their books to leave, I dared to whisper, "So, uh… you gonna be at Tyler's on Saturday?"

"What?" he said, looking at me as if I had just belched the Preamble to the Constitution.

"Um. Tyler's party? You going?"

"How'd you hear about that?" he asked sharply.

"Never mind," I said, grabbing my books to my chest and shuffling out before he could see my eyes welling up with tears. Jessica was out of her mind if she thought there would be any, as she put it, _laid-getting_ to be had. Edward would have to be drunk off his ass, and I'd have to be wearing a paper bag on my head.

***

"So, uh, Dad, I've got to work on a project with Jessica tomorrow night." In my head I added, _A project concerning the laid-getting of one Bella Swan_.

"The Stanley girl?" He furrowed his brow. "You know I don't like you hanging out with her. She's bad news."

"_Dad_," I said, rolling my eyes when my back was turned, "don't be so narrow minded. She's my friend. And it's for, you know, school. It's not like I have a _choice_. Do you want me to _fail_?"

"I don't like it," he said, drumming his fingers on the countertop. "But it's for school?"

"It's, um, a project. I was wondering if I could stay over so we could just get it done, and, you know, minimize contact. Or whatever." I shrugged, making it look as if I didn't care one way or another.

"Fine," he sighed. Sometimes he didn't have the fight in him. He probably never meant for his life to end up this way, solo-parenting a hormonal teenage girl while trying to keep a small town in order. I should have felt guiltier about pushing him this way, but I also had a ball of fury in my belly that he was somehow responsible for my social ineptitude. If he weren't so awkward, maybe I would have had a chance socially. Maybe Mom wouldn't have left him. "Need me to drop you off?" he asked with kinder eyes, and I nodded gratefully.

Okay, maybe I did feel a little guilty.

***

I waved Charlie off from Jessica's porch, but he wouldn't drive away. He waited until Jessica's mom answered the door. She was in her bathrobe. I wasn't sure if she had on anything underneath. She held the door open for me and said, "Go on in. I'm going to have a smoke." She dragged her slippered feet over the painted wooden slats of the porch and tapped her pack of cigarettes against her palm. I glanced over my shoulder as I walked into the house. I thought I saw Charlie shake his head as he finally drove off.

The bad feelings that weighed my heart down like a stone dissipated as soon as Jessica ran down the stairs. "Bella! You did it! That's my girl." She grabbed my arm and dragged me up to her room. She had several outfits laid out on her bed. "We've got a lot of work to do, and Newton's going to be here in a few to pick us up."

I wrinkled my nose. "Newton?" Mike Newton smelled like socks and was somewhat of a meathead.

"Shut up," Jessica said. "He's got a car—well, his mom's car. So what if he's got that stupid crustache thing going? Car equals hot commodity."

"Have you and Newton…?" I couldn't finish the sentence; my face was burning hot already.

"Meh," she shrugged. "I barely even noticed. Pencil dick, you know."

I just stared at her.

She laughed. "Of course you don't know. But it was worth it—now he's, like, my personal car service. Totally worth the five minutes of nothing."

A sudden fear gripped me. "Have you and Cullen …?" Again, I couldn't finish the question.

"You know, I'm not sure," she said, concentrating. "Maybe? I guess it wasn't so memorable if it happened. Eighth grade maybe? Maybe it was just third base."

I sat shakily on the edge of the bed, crinkling some sort of tiny top that jingled.

"Oh, please, Bella!" She plunked herself next to me. "That's the past. The fuzzy, drunken past. Tonight … now tonight is the present! And, uh, future. Soon to be future? No, the present is always the present…"

"I'm totally out of my league here, aren't I?"

"Don't be silly," she said, patting my hand. "When I'm through with you, no one will even recognize you."

I felt shy stripped down to my underwear and bra. Jessica looked at me like an art appraiser. "Bella, dude, you have knockers like that, and you hide them like a novice from the Sisters of Flannel? It's a crime, it is." She threw something with hooks and eyes and laces at me.

"I don't even know how to put this on," I said, turning the piece of fabric and boning around and around in my hands.

"Here, let me." I felt like a woman of leisure from another time as she hooked and laced me up. And when I looked at myself in the mirror, I felt like an old-timey prostitute.

"I don't know about this, Jessica."

"Are you kidding me? You look ah-mah-zing. Edward won't even be able to look you in the eye. You will mesmerize him with your tittays."

"Oh god."

"Put these on." She thrust a pair of skinny dark jeans at me. We were about the same size.

"Are they supposed to be this constrictive?" I said as I jumped up and down to pull the pants up to my hips. It was like being in a potato sack race. A potato sack race designed to cut off the circulation to the lower half of my body.

"Your ass will look exceptional," she said, pursing her lips and putting on gloss in her vanity mirror.

"I look, you know, _trampy_," I said to Jessica's reflection.

"Bella, you do realize that those are _my clothes_, right? And therefore you are implying that _I_ am _trampy_?"

"Jessica, you _are_ trampy."

She laughed. "As long as we're clear on that," she said, returning to her lip gloss.

I jumped as Newton leaned on his horn three times, not bothering to come to the door. When you fooled around with guys just for car privileges, I guessed they didn't feel obligated to get out of their cars.

"I'm not ready!" I shrieked, covering my chest with my hands. There was way too much skin showing.

Jessica threw open the window. "Keep your pants on, Mike. We'll be down in a sec." She walked back to the vanity and turned to me with an eyeliner in her hand. "Now hold still."

***

"Stanley," nodded Newton as she got in the car. "Who's your friend?" I crossed my arms over corseted chest. My eyes felt odd and sticky with makeup. The mascara weighed down my eyelashes so much that blinking was almost an aerobic activity. _Exhale upon exertion_, I thought as I struggled to open my eyes.

Jessica brayed in laughter. "Newton, it's Bella Swan! Jesus!"

I maneuvered my way into the backseat. The tight jeans and heels made me about as graceful as a newborn colt. "Hey," I said, meeting Newton's eyes in the rearview mirror. I saw the reflection of his eyes, and I saw them dip downward. I didn't know how much he could see in the mirror, but I slumped back and crossed my arms more tightly across my chest.

Jessica turned from the front seat. "I told you—you look fabulous. You-Know-Who is going to flip."

"Who?" asked Newton.

"Eyes on the road, Newton," snapped Jessica.

"You're such a bitch," he muttered, but he also stopped talking.

We could hear the music thumping from nearly a block away, and there were cars everywhere: all along both sides of the street, all up Tyler's driveway, all over his front lawn. His parents would probably have a shit-fit when they came home and saw their carefully landscaped grass all torn up. Newton parked the car halfway down a ditch. Smooth. Real smooth.

"Are you going to be able to get the car back out?" I asked.

Jessica hopped out of the car and opened my door. "Don't worry, Bella," she whispered in my ear. "I'll get us home somehow. Or maybe you'll, you know, already have a ride." Hollering her arrival, she ran into the house, waving her arms in the air and waiting for someone to press a red plastic Solo cup into her hands. She downed the first cup in one gulp and leaned on the upperclassman who'd handed it to her. She twirled around until she made eye contact with me, blew a kiss, and said, "Go get 'im, Tiger."

I tottered toward the house, my borrowed heels poking little holes into the damp grass. I didn't want to go in. I was out of my element. But as I pushed my way through the crowded foyer, no one was pointing or laughing. Jessica's disguise was more effective than I could have imagined. People looked at me curiously, appraisingly. I could nearly feel the heat on my skin as guys looked at me, the same guys who looked _through_ me in the hallways at school. Girls looked at me as if I were a threat. I understood, a little, the power Jessica had. I could understand the draw of this kind of attention. It didn't feel like me, but I could understand the appeal.

I scanned the hallways, the crowded common spaces, looking for the tousled hair, the carefully studied slouch of Edward Cullen. I didn't see him anywhere. I fought the urge to cry. I felt ridiculous. My skin didn't even feel like my own under the weight of the makeup that Jessica had slapped on.

And then I heard the sirens.

"Fuck, the cops! Someone fucking called the cops!" Crowley shouted, killing the sound system. "Guys, help me hide the keg! Fucking fuck!"

People started running out of the house like rats jumping off a sinking ship. I took a peek out the front window and saw Charlie walking up the steps.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.

I had to hide. I ran toward the back of the house, trying to find an unlocked door, a closet, anything. I found Jessica in a spare bedroom, wrapped around a senior whose name I didn't know. I tapped her in the shoulder while she tongue-wrestled with this thick-necked jock. "My dad's here. Hide, okay? If he sees you, I'm dead."

She waved me away as if I were a pesky mosquito, and I closed the door on them.

I found a door leading to the basement. I couldn't find the light switch, so I held onto the unfinished wooden railing and edged down the stairs. It was quiet here, and I loved the damp smell of basements. I could hear laundry tumbling and smell fabric softener. I felt my way in the dark, still searching for a light. I heard someone exhale sharply. I wasn't alone.

"Hello?" I said softly. "Someone there?"

I walked toward the sound of the tumbling dryer. Maybe there was one of those string lights by the laundry machines. "Come on," I mumbled to myself. "Adjust to the fucking dark already."

I heard someone snort. Someone close by. I stifled a scream. Whoever was here was someone from Crowley's party. I tried to push images from horror films out of my brain. I ran into the washing machine, which made a hollow, metallic sound when my bony knees thumped against it.

There was another snicker. "What's so fucking funny?" I demanded.

"You stumbling around like Helen Keller and swearing like a sailor," came a smooth voice to my right. Edward Cullen. Oh my god.

I felt around toward the voice, my eyes still not adjusted. I touched denim, warm from the muscular legs underneath. I pulled my hands back. "Sorry," I muttered. I felt a cool, rough hand on mine.

"Watch it. You nearly punched me in the junk."

"Oh. Oh. Jesus, I'm sorry." I was glad for the dark, so he couldn't see how red I was blushing. "What are you doing down here anyway?"

"Eh. I fucking hate parties." My eyes finally had started adjusting to the near darkness, and I could see a vague Edward-like shape sitting on top of the dryer.

I struggled to hop onto the washing machine casually, but Jessica's heels and Ace-bandage-like jeans made my legs as unbendable as a Barbie doll's. Edward laughed and offered a hand. I'd like to say that with his assistance I hoisted myself onto the washing machine with the elegance of Grace Kelly. In reality, I fumbled and skittered my way up like some sort of clumsy prehistoric lizard that probably went extinct due to its extreme clumsiness.

By the time I had flipped around so I was sitting next to him on the edge of the washing machine, I had lost all dignity and cool points I might have had. I decided to play it up, putting my arms in the air as if I'd landed a fantastic dismount and triumphantly singing, "Taa-daa!"

He snickered. "Nice work, Slim."

"Are you calling me slim because I'm skinny or because I remind you of Slim Jims?"

"I'm a man of mystery."

"Slim Shady?"

Nothing.

"Fatboy Slim?" I tried.

Silence.

"Virginia Slims?"

"Yes," he said, voice dripping with sarcasm. "I called you 'Slim' because you resemble cigarettes marketed to women who equate lung cancer with feminism."

"You still haven't told me why you're here." I didn't know if it was the semi-anonymity of the dark that made me bolder, or Jessica's clothes. I didn't really feel like myself. I was just acting a role.

"I did. I hate parties. So I hid down here."

"Why'd you come here if you hate parties?"

"What else is there to do?"

I shrugged. I doubted he could see me in the dark. "Shrug," I said.

"Did you just say, 'Shrug'?"

"Yeah. I had nothing to say in response to your question, so I shrugged. But I figured you couldn't see it in the dark, so I was, like, giving audio cues for the visually impaired."

"Blink."

"Are you blinking at me?" I asked.

"Nod."

"Jackass."

"Pout."

"Silent judging," I said.

"_Hurt feelings_," he said, and I snorted. Finally I said, "No, but seriously, why did you come down here?"

"I like laundry rooms. My mom says I didn't sleep well when I was a baby, so she'd put me in a laundry basket full of towels, and put the basket on top of the dryer while it ran. She read somewhere that it sounds like the mother's heartbeat in utero or some shit."

"Oh. That's cute."

"Not cute. Manly. Why did _you_ come down here?"

"The fuzz."

"What?"

"The cops came to bust up the party—didn't you hear the sirens?"

"No—dryer's on."

"Oh, right."

"Are they still up there?" he asked.

"Let me listen." And I held my breath and stared at the ceiling, as if I had x-ray vision and could see through the wood to the party above. I could still hear panicked scuffling, chair legs scraping, chattering. "Yeah, I think so."

Right on cue, the basement door swung open, and a flashlight beam swept across the wooden stairs, the concrete floor. I tucked my feet up in case my legs could be seen from the top of the stairs.

"Shit," I hissed.

"What's the problem, Slim?" he whispered back.

"My dad thinks I'm working on a school project with Stanley."

"So?"

"_So_, my dad? Is the police chief? Will send me to Siberian labor camp for being at a party with underage drinking?"

"Shit, Swan, is that you?"

"Who'd you think it was?" We were still speaking in whispers, although the cop at the doorway had long given up.

"I don't know. Mysterious hot girl."

"You thought I was hot?"

"Shut up."

"Why do you hate me so much?"

"I don't hate you, Swan."

"Then why do you look at me like that?"

"Like what?"

"I can't well demonstrate in the dark here, now, can I?"

"Shrug."

"Indignation."

"No, tell me, Swan," he said at a more normal volume once we'd heard the sirens fade away. "How do I look at you?"

I hung my head down, speaking to my sternum. "You know. Like I smell bad. Like you can't stand me."

"I do?"

"Never mind." I hopped off the edge of the washer, intending to tromp back upstairs, find Jessica, and beg her to get us a ride home. Instead, I landed funny on the heels, and my ankle buckled. I fell down hard onto the concrete. Everything smelled like Tide and mildew. "Fuck!"

"Swan, you all right there?"

I rubbed my ankle. "These aren't my shoes," I said stupidly.

I could see his dark form slide off the edge of the dryer. "Come on." He held out his hand again, reaching in my general direction. I put my hand in his, and he pulled me to standing. "Can you walk?" he asked. He was near enough that I could smell the alcohol on his breath.

"Let me see," I said. I took one step and cried out in pain.

"Can you make it to the steps?" he asked, propping me up against his side.

"Yeah, I guess so," I said, trying to sniff his sleeve surreptitiously.

We sat on the steps, and he removed Jessica's shoe. I heard a giant clap, hands rubbing together, and then I felt Edward's warm hands on my bare ankle.

"You did _not_ just do the Mr. Miyagi _Karate Kid_ thing," I said.

"Actually, yes, I'm pretty sure I just did. And so what?"

"Shrug." I leaned back on my hands as he massaged my ankle, trying to regulate my breathing.

"It doesn't feel swollen. We might still be able to save the leg."

"Yeah, thanks," I muttered. "I never knew you were such a smartass."

"Well, I never knew you had such a potty mouth. You are a dirty girl, Isabella Swan."

"I am not, you cocksucker."

"I'd like to kiss that filthy mouth of yours."

"So fucking do it already," I dared him, barely breathing, still feeling bold in Jessica's clothes.

He cupped my face in his hands and tugged me forward. All I could smell was booze and Edward, and then his mouth was on me, soft and wet and tasting of rum.

The dryer buzzed, and the spell was broken. He jumped back from me as if waking from a dream and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

"Bella? Bella!" I could hear Jessica calling for me.

I was silent for a minute, considering, but finally I answered, "Down here."

"Where is the fucking door?" I could hear her muttering and swearing as she opened doors and cabinets in the kitchen.

"I'm not in the fucking utensil drawer!" I shouted. "I'm not a ladle."

"What the fuck's a ladle?" Jessica muttered. I heard fumbling, and then the door swung open. The kitchen light was on, and the light fell like running water down the stairs, ending in a puddle where Edward and I sat.

"Holy fuck, is that Edward Cullen?" said Jessica, swaying a little.

"'Sup, Stanley?" he said wearily, scooting away a little from me on the stair.

"Way to go, Bella!" she hooted and clapped.

I wanted to die. I wanted to die dead of mortification. I was going to die right there on the steps, and Charlie would find me in Crowley's basement. I could picture the jagged chalk outline of me on the stairs to indicate how the police had discovered me.

"I should go," I muttered, carefully getting to my feet. I didn't touch Edward. He'd made it abundantly clear he didn't want to be seen with me. I snatched the one shoe from his lap and kicked off the other heel. Holding the killer shoes in one hand, I was able to climb the stairs. I limped a little from the previous ankle twisting.

"Your shoes suck ass, Stanley," I said as I met her at the top. "Can we go home now?"

***

Newton had taken off when Charlie and the cops showed up, so Jessica had arranged for the no-necked upperclassman from the spare bedroom to take us home. I leaned my head back and tried to ignore the rubbing sounds from the front seat. I had the feeling that Jessica was hand-deep in jock-crotch.

As we pulled up to Jessica's house, she said, "Okay, I'm going to hang out with Randy some more here, so you make yourself at home."

"You're not coming in with me?"

"Bella, come on, be cool." She gave me a look, dangerous and angry. Even though she'd never looked at me this way before, I knew not to push her.

Meekly, I opened the door and climbed up her steps, still barefoot. Meathead Randy floored it as soon as the door was shut, leaving me coughing in a cloud of exhaust. The asphalt driveway was cold and rough against my feet. Her front door was unlocked, and I could hear her mom snoring from the living room, splayed out on the couch with an empty bottle next to her hand.

I tiptoed up the stairs, struggling to free myself from Jessica's ridiculous corset. I ended up having to twist it around my body so I could undo the hooks from the front. I pulled my scruffy clothes back on, wiped off the lipstick with a rough tissue. I scrubbed my face in her bathroom.

I tried to sleep in her bed, but it felt weird. Her sheets were sandy, and after the display in the car, I wasn't sure her bed was the cleanest place to be. I hugged my knees to myself before deciding that what I really wanted was to go home.

I put my sneakers back on and crept down the stairs. There was no need to be so cautious, though, because Mrs. Stanley was still passed out on the couch. I stopped by the living room to put a blanket on her. I just felt bad seeing her all flopped out like that, her legs shockingly bare and visible through the opening of the robe.

The front door closed behind me with a click with the finality of a litigator's closing statement.

It was about a mile and a half between Jessica's house and mine, and I didn't worry about running into anyone. I was probably more in danger from wildlife than I was roving gangs or muggers. Nothing ever happened in Forks.

I was still limping a little, but the walk went by surprisingly quickly as I remembered the feeling of Edward's hands on my bare ankle. _He touched me. Oh my god, he kissed me_.

Maybe school would be different on Monday. Maybe I'd be different. Could people see his kiss on my face?

The house was dark when I got back, but I still avoided the creaky step on the porch. Charlie was probably long asleep. I'd put my hand on the hood of the police cruiser as I walked past. It was cold, so he must have been home for a while.

I was thinking of how I would explain my presence there in the morning, but I was also hoping he'd be gone first thing fishing, and I could pretend Jessica's mom had dropped me off while he was gone. I'd have to be super quiet in my room.

I'd just started up the stairs when I heard Charlie call from the living room. "Bella? Why are you home? How did you get here?"

Shit.

"Why are you sitting in the dark, Dad?"

"Couldn't sleep. It's hard sometimes, when you're not home. I worry."

"_Dad_," I said, rolling my eyes. He couldn't see me. "Nothing's going to happen to me." I thought of the way Edward had jumped back from me when the dryer buzzer interrupted us. "Like, ever."

"I worry, kid. I had to bust up a party tonight, kids your age getting drunk and doing god knows what."

I was very thankful for the darkness. I thought again of that look on Jessica's face, the one that had told me to get the hell out of the car. I thought of Jessica's house with her mom passed out on the couch. Maybe she wasn't so happy after all.

"You know I'm not like that, Dad," I said, feeling guilty about lying to him. Maybe this was all a trap to get me to admit I hadn't gone over to Jessica's for homework. I was thankful I'd thought to wash my face before coming home.

"So I thought you were going to stay over," he said. "Did you walk home?"

"I did." I walked into the living room and sat next to him on the couch. "We were done, and I kind of missed my bed."

"Bells, you should have called me."

"It was totally safe. You know how boring this town is. Anyway, it's the middle of the night!"

"I'm the police chief; I'm ready to go at the drop of a hat! I sleep in my uniform!"

"You do?" I asked, trying to picture it.

"Well, no. But you can call me anytime. I hope you know that."

"Yeah," I said, leaning my head on his shoulder. We sat like that for a while in the dark. For a minute I kind of missed being small enough to climb into his lap, to have him carry me up the stairs to bed. I had memories of being half-asleep, carried to bed, and having him tug my shoes off before he tucked me in, trying his hardest not to wake me up.

I started nodding off a little. I might have drooled on his shoulder. "I'm going to bed," I announced, and I gave him a peck on the cheek. He patted me a few times on my back, fatherly thumps through flannel. I made my way upstairs, not stopping to brush my teeth or change out of my clothes. I slid into my bed with the clean sheets, sheets that had held only me. The sheets were smooth and cool, not greasy and gritty like Jessica's.

As I lay awake in bed, staring at the ceiling and trying to remember how Edward tasted on my tongue, I listened to the house as it settled for the night. During the day I never noticed house sounds, but in the quiet of night and dark, the house seemed alive. The humming and hissing from the heating system, the clang of the radiators, how had I never noticed before how much it sounded like a heartbeat?

I heard Charlie eventually climb the stairs, his bedroom door creaking and complaining as he pushed it open. I thought of how he complained about his joints. He was getting older, but I felt no wiser, no more able to function without him, as much as I ached to be a grown-up. I heard him sigh heavily through our thin walls, and I knew he was finally asleep.

I listened to the house breathe, my eyes open, my heart thumping, beating faster when I thought of Edward Cullen's mouth on mine. I wondered if the house could see my heart glowing like an ember under the blanket, so hot, so heavy, such a weight in my chest.

I don't know how long I lay there awake in the dark, how long I listened to my father's breathing and the house's creaks and murmurs, thinking of baby Edward asleep on folded towels and sheets, dreaming of his mother's heartbeat.

**

* * *

A/N: I'm up for auction again, this time for the Fandom Gives Back—up to 15 drabbles for bids of $25 and higher ($25 = at least 250 words, $30 = 300, etc.). In addition, I am offering up to three one-shots of at least 3000 words for offers of $100 and higher. Finally, I'm auctioning off a handknit (by me) pair of Bella mittens, opening bid $30. The links to my auctions are in my profile. ****You can prompt the story/drabble****—****nothing's off the table except for anything that will mess with continuity or integrity of my existing stories. Please check out the auction—lots of amazing authors up for sale, and for a very good cause.**


	6. Walls

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Walls**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: N/A (BPOV)**

**Rating: T**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing except two keys that make me really sad.  
**

I stared at the keys in my hand, looped on the plain metal keyring. My apartment keys, my office keys, plastic retail keycards, my bus pass, tiny safety deposit box keys. And two nondescript keys that I couldn't bear to touch.

I swallowed down the lump in my throat and put the keys back in my purse. _They're just keys. That's all. They don't represent anything. They're toothed scraps of metal that once were relevant. _

When would I feel like an adult? Here I was, in my late twenties, a good job, a happy life. I went out on dates, I had friends, and life was … easy. But why did I feel like a child all the time? Why did I miss home so much?

Even the word _home_ set me off again, and I sat down heavily on the bus. I was determined not to cry in public. I was a grown woman.

We never had a lot of money growing up, but we were happy. My dad had used his parents' inheritance as a downpayment for the house. A week later, he met my mom. She was so impressed that he owned his own home, this handsome, fit young man just out of police academy. They fell in love, got married, and had me. Like a fairy tale.

Even though I couldn't have been there, I liked to imagine the first time my mom and dad entered the house as man and wife. I was quite sure Charlie would have insisted on carrying his bride over the threshold. Renee would have laughed, maybe covered her open smile with her hand. I'd studied the faded wedding photos so closely as a child. Renee wore a simple knee-length dress—satin, it looked like, from the photos. She had on a little birdcage veil attached to a retro pillbox hat. Charlie wore a suit. They'd gotten married at the courthouse with Renee's parents and a couple of Charlie's friends from the academy. It was a small, simple wedding because Charlie couldn't bear to plan something flashier, knowing that his parents weren't there to see him. And as neither the bride nor the groom was particularly religious, the courthouse would do, a justice of the peace the only authority they needed to seal their union.

I liked to imagine Charlie in his plain suit carrying Renee, kicking and laughing, over the threshold. I liked to imagine a year and change later, Renee's belly growing ripe and round and Charlie sitting beside her, his hand resting on the firm globe of promise. I liked to think I could feel his love pulsing from his palm through fabric, skin, muscle, crossing the ocean of amniotic fluid, right to me, right to my heart. I was growing in my mother, who was, in turn, safe and secure in the house the Charlie had bought before he knew we two would be changing his life forever.

I liked to think she sang to me while I was still on the inside, that Charlie talked to me, his mustache tickling my mother's skin. And that my rapidly developing ears could hear soothing, deep murmurs and watery lullabies.

I'd asked again and again the story of my birth. "Well, kiddo," Charlie always began, "in true Bella fashion, you were a week late. I'd made my special three-alarm chili to try to kickstart things."

"What were you wearing in the kitchen? Did you wear an apron? Did you get tomato sauce on your shirt? Were the walls the same color as they are now?" I'd interrupt, bouncing up and down on my heels.

"Sweatpants, yes, yes, and yes," he'd answer.

"And then what happened?" I'd ask, even though I knew what came next.

"Well now, your mother wanted to taste the chili straight from the pot, but I wasn't done seasoning. So she tried to wrestle the wooden spoon from me, which was foolish, because _hello_, cop versus pregnant lady, and then her face went white. I thought she was having a contraction, but it turned out she was just faking it to distract me so she could steal the spoon."

I would try to imagine my parents playing around like little kids in this kitchen.

"But the joke was on her, because she took one taste of my chili, and her water broke all over the floor."

"_Ewwwww_," I'd say.

"Well, good thing it was in the kitchen—at least there wasn't any carpeting! We both doubled over laughing, and that's how you were born, Bella—with laughter and love and three-alarm chili."

I'd sigh happily and ask Charlie for a glass of milk and a snack, and he'd always comply. "Don't tell your mother," he'd say, ruffling my hair and setting a plate of Nilla Wafers or Chips Ahoy in front of me.

Every room in that house held memories—my mother making alterations on my prom dress in the living room, pins stuck between her lips, the tub upstairs filled with that crappy oatmeal stuff when I had the chicken pox, my parents' bed, where I would sleep when I had nightmares or was sick, my parents acting as protective bookends. And of course, my room, where I wrote in my diary, listened to loud music on headphones, put up posters of boy bands, and doodled the name of my latest crush on my canvas binder.

I knew something was wrong the minute I saw that my mom was calling me on my phone. I just did, a chill, a feeling that our lives had completely changed.

"Bella, oh honey."

"What? What is it? Is Dad okay?" I clutched my hand to my chest.

Long pause. A sigh.

"_Tell _me, Mom. Please."

"He's … he's going to be fine."

"What happened?"

She sighed again. "There was … an incident at the high school."

"_Is Dad okay_?" I was hyperventilating now. Renee had such a frustrating habit of talking around an issue, like a kid eating around vegetables on a dinner plate.

"Charlie's fine. He … shot a kid today. This kid was standing on the roof, yelling and shouting, trouble kid, you know. He was waving a gun around, so your dad had to shoot."

"Oh, god." I sat heavily on my bed. "Is everyone okay?"

"Well, the boy, he … he died. But no one else was hurt."

"It could have been much worse," I said, still numb.

"But, see, when the paramedics and cops got to the roof, they saw the gun wasn't real. Just a toy gun the kid had covered in electrical tape."

"Oh," I said. I had _wanted_ to say, "Oh, poor Dad," because I knew how much it must have been tearing him up inside, but it seemed insensitive to pity him before I pitied the child who'd died.

"What happens now?" I asked.

"Your dad has to turn in his gun and badge while they do the investigation."

"But he was trying to protect all those innocent people—he didn't know!" I said, my voice tinged with hysteria.

In the end, Charlie was cleared of all charges. Some still called him a hero, but he wasn't the same. He asked to be put off of active duty. He stepped down as sheriff. He sat behind a desk. He rearranged his paperweights, the small, framed school photos, the horrible ashtray I'd made him in third grade art.

Then he stopped getting out of bed. He was haunted by that boy's eyes, he'd said. He couldn't bear the thought that he'd taken someone's Bella away.

I knew things were bad when I went home for Christmas. Charlie left his room maybe twice. He never got out of his pajamas. I never saw him leave the house. Mom and I went to midnight Mass. We always went to midnight Mass, the three of us. Even though my parents weren't religious, they couldn't resist sharing the beautiful candlelight service with me, to give me experiences mirroring their own warm childhood Christmas memories. When we blew out the candles at the end of Mass, the whole church smelled like birthday cake.

It felt weird, wrong, to go to midnight Mass without Dad. I clutched the fragile candle in my hands, trying hard not to let the wax drip onto my skin. _If I keep the wax from dripping, Dad will be okay_, I said to myself, as if I had any power over the situation at all. I'd made it nearly the whole Mass, but then at the sign of peace, I forgot that Charlie wasn't with us. I reached around Renee to hug him as I always did, to whisper, "Merry Christmas" in his ear, feel his midnight stubble on my cheek. But he wasn't there, and my shock was punctuated by the hot wax that dripped onto the back of my hand.

Dad wasn't okay. He took a leave of absence at first, but eventually he just quit. I didn't know if they would have put him on disability—he might have been eligible. But it didn't matter. He didn't think he deserved the money. "I killed a child," I overheard him say to my mom. "How can I ever show my face again?"

I didn't even think it was about shame. Sure, he was a little concerned about what people thought, but it was really about not being able to forgive himself. The trouble was that he'd always seen every person like a universe, with infinite potential for greatness and life. And in his eyes, he had destroyed an entire universe. I could see it in his eyes, that bewildered look as if he were wishing so hard to wake up from this nightmare. He wished so hard that he'd wake up in his bed, that it never would have happened. The boy would still be alive. But every day he wandered through the house in his pajamas, haunted by the boy's ghost, replaying the scene in his mind again and again, wishing he could stop time, stop the cycle, _not_ pull the trigger. Just once. Just once not pull the fucking trigger.

He couldn't even bear to look at me. It was as if he felt he didn't deserve to have me if he had taken someone else's child. No matter how many times people told him it wasn't his fault, that he was just doing his job. He remembered his hand on my mother's firm, round belly, whispering to the daughter he loved, even though he'd never seen her face, and he imagined this boy's parents doing the same.

Mom didn't tell me how bad things had gotten. I shouldn't have been surprised—Charlie hadn't worked for months, and Mom didn't make so much money as an administrative assistant. But I just kept living my life, far away from home, hoping that if I didn't think about it, that everything would be fine.

Would I have been able to do anything, had I known? Maybe, maybe not. I had enough money for a modest singleton existence, going out for drinks with my friends once a week, buying pretty shoes that caught my eye in a storefront window. Maybe they should have told me while I could have helped. I could have spared a few hundred a month.

It probably wouldn't have made a difference anyway. In any case, I'd just gone to bed one night when my phone rang. My heart beat wildly against my ribs—any calls at this hour of night made me nervous. I knew my parents lived three hours behind, but I still couldn't help panicking every time the phone rang when the night sky had turned to black velvet.

"Bella, sweetie," my mom said as soon as I answered in a voice husky with sleep. "I don't know how to say this." It sounded as if she had been crying.

"Is Dad okay?" I clapped my hand over my mouth, expecting the worst.

"We … we lost the house."

"Wait, wait, what? What does that even mean? How do you lose a house?" I wasn't quite awake yet.

"The bank foreclosed."

I was thankful Charlie was safe, but … this wasn't the way things happened, was it? Wasn't there a long process? "Can they do that without warning like that? Aren't they supposed to …" I trailed off, raking my fingers through my disheveled hair. I didn't know how the adult world of real estate and mortgages worked. I had a few friends who had bought condos, but I could not begin to understand when they'd talk of PMI, equity, home inspections … the closest I'd ever come to understanding mortgages was when I'd played Monopoly with my family as a child.

"Oh, Bella, we didn't want to worry you. We kept thinking we could make it work."

"Where … where will you go?"

"We'll be all right. We found a small place, a little basement apartment."

My heart sank, trying to imagine my parents living in dampness, in darkness. "Are there windows? Is it bright?" I asked, my voice quavering.

"There are windows, long and skinny, perfect for a sunbathing snake," Renee said, trying to make me laugh. "And, Bella dear, nothing in Forks is bright."

"Oh," I said, imagining my parents like potted plants, wilting without the sunshine.

"It's going to be okay, Bella. Don't worry about us."

"Okay," I said numbly, my brain still unable to wrap itself around the information. I was having trouble breathing, as if the news had lodged itself in my windpipe.

We were quiet for a while, until finally I asked, "When?"

"We move next week."

I nodded even though she couldn't see me, and silent tears dropped onto my blanket.

"We're going to be fine, okay, honey?"

"Yeah." I didn't want her to know I was crying. I pretended it was fatigue. I feigned a yawn, but a little sob snuck in at the tail end. "I'm sorry, Mom. I'm really sleepy. Can we talk about this tomorrow?"

"Sure, of course, sweetheart. I'm sorry to keep you up."

"Love you."

"You too."

I waited for her to hang up the phone first, and I flopped on my pillow and sobbed until sleep took me.

I woke up with the heavy, languid bliss that comes in the moments between sleep and full wakefulness, when your life seems perfect. But then my brain escaped the Lethe-like sleepy forgetfulness, and it all came flooding back. My dad. The bank. The house. _Our_ house. _My home_.

It was the only house I'd ever known, the only place that meant _home_ to me. I'd moved so many times in college and in the years since graduation, but the ratty dorms and apartments were all just places where I laid my head at night, where I kept my stuff. My heart always was in the house Charlie had secured with his inheritance, the only gift I'd received from the grandparents I'd never had the chance to meet.

Now where would I go? Where would the holidays be? Would we huddle in this basement like escaped prisoners?

_Next week_. I wouldn't even get to say goodbye. I wouldn't be able to scratch my name into the paint in some dark corner, so a part of me would always be there, no matter who bought the house. What about my clothes? My shoeboxes of letters from my fifth grade penpal? My birthday cards? My photographs?

I guessed they'd box everything up and take it with them. But could they box up the smell of the house? Every time I went home, I was transported back to childhood just by the familiar, unique smell. It would cling to my clothing for a few days after my return and slip away molecule by molecule, so slowly that I wouldn't even notice that I'd gone back to smelling like a stranger.

I'd never smell home again.

_Home isn't a physical place, Bella_, I tried to convince myself. But I had no idea what would happen. I felt as though I would float away from the world without a place to call _home_. Would _home_ be wherever my parents were? Or was it a fixed point? Was its essence trapped in these walls that had been reclaimed by the bank?

Today was the day of the move. I hadn't intended to, but I called in sick to work. I went to the city's public library, the big one with the stone lions out front. I sat in the children's room, comforted by the musty smell of the dark carpet dotted with cookie crumbs crushed by so many tiny, shoed feet. I sat in a chair far too small for me and surrounded myself with books from my youth: _Frog and Toad Are Friends_, _Betsy-Tacy_, _The Trumpet of the Swan_. I tried not to think of my parents packing up my entire history into the rental van. I tried not to think about them shutting the door behind them for the last time. What happened next? Would they be forced to slip the keys back under the door? Would they leave the house unlocked? Would they have to go to the bank in person and turn in their keys as if they were checking out of a hotel?

Whenever my thoughts wandered to the house, I buried my nose in another kid's book. _The Wind in the Willows_. _The 21 Balloons_. _The Westing Game_. Finally, the head librarian's voice crackled over the intercom to let us know the library was closing. It was already dark outside. It was over. They must have finished moving by now.

As I walked into the cool night air, on a whim I dialed my familiar home number, the one my dad had made me memorize as soon as I was able, so if I ever got separated from my parents, I'd be able to tell a police officer or teacher. The number was part of me. I half-hoped that my mom or dad would answer. Maybe it had all been a dream.

I should have been prepared for the screeching three-note error sound letting me know the line had been disconnected, but it still was a shock. I had a big lump in my throat, and I rolled my eyes at myself—_They're just fucking numbers. Ten little numbers. They don't mean anything_. But they were the only ten numbers I'd ever known.

I didn't even know the new number. I didn't know if they'd even decided to get a landline at all. I tried to remember the last time I called my home number. I couldn't. Mom had been the one to call me the last few times.

I wished I'd called home one last time, so I would always remember the last time. Now there would be no last time. There would be no more phone calls home. There would be only the memory of my fingers on the keypad tracing the familiar path. I could sing the touch-tones of my phone number, my personal song that connected me with my parents. But now the song was meaningless, just noise.

My phone started to ring just as I'd rung the stop signal on the bus. I flipped my phone open while holding onto a pole, ready for the bus to lurch to a stop. I didn't recognize the number.

"Hello?" The bus jerked, and I nearly tumbled. The doors opened with a squeak and a hiss, and I made my way down the steep stairs. I paced around on the sidewalk as the bus drove away, leaving me in a cloud of diesel exhaust.

"Bells, it's Mom." I pulled the phone away from my ear and looked at the number on the display. _That's not home_, I thought. I tried to gain a sense of comfort from the curves and sharp angles of the numbers, but I couldn't curl into them. These numbers were cold and lifeless.

"Where are you?"

"In the new place," she said. She sounded tired. I was glad she hadn't said she was _home_.

"How'd it go?" I walked the block or so to my building and dug my hand into my purse to fish out the keys.

"Long day. You know how stubborn your dad can be. He nearly threw his back out trying to carry too much at once."

"How is he?"

"Okay, I think. Tired. He took a bath. He's sleeping now."

"Is he going to be all right?" I unlocked my front door and walked into this temporary space. It saddened me to think that this bare apartment was now more familiar than wherever my mother sat right now speaking to me. I plunked myself on the sofa and stared at the keys in my hand.

"Honestly, Bella, I think moving was good for him. I think he needed the change."

"But he lost everything," I blurted out. "He lost the last thing his parents gave him."

"Oh, honey," Renee said, and I could almost feel her cool hands smoothing my hair away from my forehead. "You know he doesn't think of it like that. Those are just objects, just _things_, meaningless. You know how much joy you bring him. That's all he needs."

I wasn't so sure that was true, remembering how he couldn't look me in the eye, consumed with guilt over that boy, the lost child. But she sounded like she believed, and I didn't want her to feel the heavy weight on my chest. I'd hold this pain inside. I wouldn't share it.

"All right," I said. "Tell Dad I love him."

"He knows. But I will."

The air felt so empty when she hung up. I went into the call history on my phone and added the new number to my contacts. It almost physically hurt me to delete the _real_ number, each tap of the backspace key like a little stab in my heart. I hit the save button, and it was as if the other number, the other house, had never existed. With a tap of a button, I could rewrite history. I shivered.

I looked at my keys again, but this time I touched the two keys that I'd avoided when I boarded the bus. The deadbolt key. The doorknob key. Should I have told them that I still had these?

I didn't care. The keys were mine. At least I'd have some piece of _home_ still with me. I took the two precious keys off my keyring, putting one in each hand. Closing my eyes, I clenched my fists tightly around the cool metal until the keys warmed to my temperature, until all I could feel were the teeth—now the same temperature as the blood pulsing under my skin—digging into my palms.

I opened my hands and let the keys drop into my lap. I stared at the red imprint of the keys on my hands, lightly tracing one and then the other with the opposite hand.

"I won't forget you," I whispered to the welts on my palms, smelling the metallic residue the keys had left on my skin.

**

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A/N: Holy crap I have a lot of these to finish by deadline.**

**I have a rec! Read the lovely NelsonSmandela's first foray into fanfic, a splendid one-shot called "Darkbloom." The link is in my profile under my faves. She is my fic-fiancée, and soon we will be joined in holy fanfictrimony.**

**And ALSO in my profile you will see links to my various auctions for the Fandom Gives Back. Drabbles can be had for cheapity! **


	7. Stagnant

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Stagnant**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: M (for grossness)**

"Edward, what is it?" Edward was acting just like that first day in bio class, making like I smelled really bad.

I know it wasn't possible for vampires to blush, but venom flowed up to his cheeks in a way that looked like sparkly, sparkly mortification.

"Nothing," he muttered, but he shuffled away from me, discreetly holding his breath.

Later that day, Jacob said, "Jesus, Bella, how long have you had that tampon in?"

"What?" It was my turn to flush scarlet.

"You might want to look into some FDS spray or some shit."

Curse my stinky box! Stupid vagina.

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**A/N: Enjoy the drabble? Buy yourself one at the Fandom Gives Back auction! Links in my profile.**


	8. Aesthetic

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Aesthetic**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Emmett x Rose**

**Rating: T**

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**Aesthetic**

Emmett had been holed up in the basement for weeks. He'd waited for summer vacation so no one would miss him at school. The day before he locked himself in, he'd sucked about three bears dry, which was a lot, even for insatiable Emmett. He'd managed to get a bear in each arm, alternating between the two: the patented Emmett "double fisting" method of hunting. It was quite a sight when he'd crush the desiccated bear carcasses against his skull like a beer can. The third bear was twice as big as the first two, so he had to tackle that one solo.

He'd come back with a distended bear gut, his clothes and head matted with fur sticky with blood. He'd rubbed his stomach, groaning a little from overeating. As he'd descended the basement stairs, he'd said that he was not to be disturbed upon pain of dismemberment and barbecued body parts. He'd had that deadly serious look in his eyes that said, "Do not fuck with Mr. Emmett."

This was not typical Emmett behavior. He was usually garrulous, sanguine, a vampire Falstaff with a much better physique.

Rosalie was confused about his voluntary isolation. She was also puzzled as to the clanging sounds, burning smells, and steady stream of expletives wafting through the basement air vents to the kitchen. He had seemed a little moody lately, perhaps, not quite himself. Could he have found someone new? Had he found _la sua cantante_? Was he going to have an annoying, Little Miss Perfect I Can Still Have Babies human pet around too? The very thought of it caused Rosalie to break her own finger as she wrung her hands. She could feel the bone mending right away, but still, it hurt like a bitch.

Rosalie tried not to get eaten alive by jealousy, but it was hard to remain calm. When you never got the temporary mental shutdown that sleep provided, your mind could churn endlessly in a tsunami of your deepest insecurities. And all she had was forever.

She'd call down the air vents, "Emmett, baby, is everything all right?"

He'd grunt, and she'd hear metal scraping on metal, things clanging, dropping to the floor. "Just fine, babe," he'd say as if nothing was wrong. But that was all he'd say, and Rosalie's stomach would twist into knots.

_It's because I'm cold and hard and spiny_, she thought. _I'm the same on the inside as I am on the outside. It was just a matter of time before he grew tired of putting up with me, me and my prickles_.

Rosalie was peevish to her family to mask the pain she was feeling inside, the doubt, the insecurity. She wished she could cry. She wished she still had that outlet for letting out that ache in her unbeating heart. It was one of the cruelest parts of the whole vampire deal. You got beauty, strength, and eternal life, but you lost the relief of tears. You just carried the pain in you, never losing it. It just circulated in your body, pooling elsewhere. But it was always still there.

She approached Edward, something she was loath to do, especially with that buzzing gnat of a human girlfriend he kept around. "Um. Edward?" she asked in a low, quiet voice. She hoped his edible barnacle couldn't hear her. He glanced at her with cold eyes. _Sorry, Edward_, she thought toward him. _Bella's fine. No, she's not a barnacle. But she is edible; you have to admit that. That's just plain facts_, she tried to joke lightly. His eyes narrowed. He had no sense of humor.

She sighed, and let a few of her veils down in her brain, let Edward scan her thoughts. _I'm scared, Edward. What if Emmett has fallen out of love with me? What if he's found his own Bella? I know you want to respect thought-hearing freak/person confidentiality, but …_ She couldn't think any more in front of the edible barnacle. She hated being that vulnerable in front of her.

"Look," Edward sighed. "He loves you. I … don't know what's going on in his head right now. I think he's blocking his thoughts. Mostly all I hear is swearing. He's got such a mouth on him, even his inside voice."

Rosalie nodded, momentarily relieved for this crumb of information, and went to her room, to lie on the bed that she shared with her Emmett. The bed where they wrestled and loved and laughed and growled but never slept. She skimmed her hands over the sheets, missing his body, missing being able to explore his valleys and plains, the ones she knew with her eyes shut. He was as much a part of her as her own body. He was the other half of her, and her heart, her undead heart, was just a fragment without his booming voice and panties-dropping grin to complete it.

She didn't leave the bed all day. She just lay there and stared at the ceiling. She stared at it so much that she named constellations in the pinpricks in the plaster. She named them all after Emmett, after some memory they shared, some feature on his face or body. Emmett's earlobe. Emmett's navel. Emmett's … stuff.

After a few days, she took to sitting against the basement door, cross-legged, pretending the unmoving wood pressed against her was Emmett's back. She imagined they were sitting in a private field on a sunny day on a blanket, back to back, talking and murmuring and just enjoying each other's presence in silence, watching the sparkles and rainbows dance off their skin. If she closed her eyes, she could believe it, but when she opened them, she remembered that it had been days since he'd touched her.

"Motherfucker!" she heard him yell after a loud clatter.

"Everything all right, honeybear?" she asked.

"No worries. Just fine. Everything's fine," he said curtly, and she wondered what she had done wrong.

Eventually Esme brought down blankets and pillows and the air mattress Carlisle had purchased off of eBay in the middle of the night because he was fascinated by the air pump. They really had no use for it, obviously, since any overnight guests had no need to sleep. But maybe Carlisle had known that something like this would happen. She brought the air mattress down, knowing she couldn't convince Rosalie to go back to her room, or out with the family. Every day and night she would sit with Rosalie for a few hours. Esme rubbed Rosalie's back and brushed her hair out and rocked her a little, as if she were a baby.

Esme had done this to the others when they were sad, and usually Rosalie would bristle if Esme tried it on her, but this time she settled in against her shoulder and let her baby her. She was surprised to discover she missed her mom, her real mom, even though it had been so long. She barely remembered what it was like to be human, but she would get flashes of hugs and sweet little forehead kisses. Her human mother hadn't been openly affectionate in front of her, afraid of appearing weak, or worried she would spoil her child, but when she thought Rosalie was asleep, she'd hold her, rock her, cover her with kisses. In her human life, Rosalie had become very good at pretending to be asleep.

"Emmett's all right," Esme said, stopping her humming for a moment. "He's just working through something. You know he loves you."

Rosalie just shrugged, wishing for tears. Eventually she put her head in Esme's lap, letting Esme stroke her hair. Esme was a good woman, and Rosalie was thankful for her selflessness and her seemingly never-ending capacity to love. She could love even her, with all her flaws and short temper and lack of trust. She loved her unconditionally, and Rosalie was grateful for that, even if she was unable to express it to Esme.

On the last day of the third week, Rosalie heard Emmett's heavy footfalls coming up the stairs. She got up off the mattress, kicked it away from the door. In her anxiety and eagerness, she didn't check her strength; her shoes punctured the vinyl mattress, which began to deflate with a slow, sad sigh. Shit. She'd have to get Carlisle a new one, and she hated dealing with the Internet or people or anything in general. Maybe she could convince Alice to do it.

Rosalie grabbed a spoon from one of the kitchen drawers and checked her reflection in the convex side. She hadn't hunted this whole time; she'd had no appetite. But now she saw that she was much the worse for wear, her cheeks sallow, her hair a mess, her eyes dark and troubled. Still, still she had no desire to hunt.

She heard Emmett making the last few steps up the rickety basement stairs, and she ran her fingers through her hair, trying to fix herself up. As a reflex, she pinched her cheeks the way she used to when she was human, before she'd go paying calls on people. Why was she so nervous?

She turned the spoon around, and saw herself upside down in the concave side. It was pretty much how she felt, like her whole world no longer made sense. Without Emmett by her side, who was she?

Emmett was fumbling with the doorknob but not succeeding. Finally he gave up and kicked the door down. Rosalie jumped back at the noise of the splintering wood. She would have smiled to herself if she hadn't been so nervous.

Emmett's face was smudged, and he looked tired. He carried … _something_ in his arms, something massive. It looked heavy. The strange object obscured part of his face, and Rosalie dug her fingers into the countertop behind her, feeling shy and judged and like a dog that knows it's going to be abandoned or drowned in a sack.

When he turned the corner, though, she saw that he was smiling widely, his dimples sweet as ever.

"Do you know what today is?" he asked.

Rosalie looked at the floor, glanced at the air mattress that was still slowly dying. She shrugged. She didn't trust her voice.

"It's my birthday," he said.

Rose's head shot up. "No it's not," she said. "And we don't celebrate those anyway. I mean, what's the point?"

"No, sweetheart," he said, gingerly laying down the gigantic … metallic … _thing_ on the table. The table collapsed under its weight, but the object maintained its bizarre shape, even when toppled on its side. "Today is the anniversary of the day we met, when you found me, when you saved me. I would have died out there. What did you see in me?"

Rosalie tucked a curl behind her ear. "I saw my future," she said quietly. She still had her eyes lowered, too afraid of what she might see in his face. His voice was kind, but maybe he was just trying to let her down easy. Maybe he was afraid of her temper if he went about this the wrong way.

"What's wrong, Rosie-bear?" Emmett asked.

Rosalie wanted to scream at him for leaving her alone for three weeks with no explanation. Emmett was her rock, unchanged by the elements, by time. And he'd gone away. But she just collapsed on his shoulder, trying so hard to cry.

"Oh, honey, sweetheart," Emmett murmured. "I wanted to surprise you. I couldn't think of a way to say thank you—I mean, we can buy anything in the world. Material stuff kind of becomes meaningless. So I made you this."

He twirled her around and gestured toward the metallic … thing that was now on its side in the rubble of what once was the kitchen table. She tilted her head to the side to try to figure out what it was. He crouched down in front of it, and she followed suit.

"What is it?" she finally asked, hoping she wasn't hurting his feelings.

"Well…" Emmett began, sighing. "I was _trying_ to make a cool metallic sculpture of you, of your face. You know, of you carrying me all broken. And that didn't work, because, well, I kind of suck."

Rose smiled a little. Emmett wasn't so good with his hands, outside of the bedroom.

"So then I tried to go abstract. You know. Try to show my emotions in a symbolic way. But that didn't work either, because this thing looks like I want to kill you or something. Because, as I said earlier, I suck."

A small chuckle escaped Rosalie's lips. She had been so quiet during the last few weeks that the laugh was a little gravelly, a little hoarse.

"So then I just said, 'Fuck it,' and slapped everything together. I hope Carlisle doesn't need the welding torch soon. Or most of his benches. Or nails. Or the basement in general. I'm sorry it looks like such ass, baby. You deserve better. But it's a piece of my heart."

"Oh, Em," Rosalie said, looking at the lumpy mass of metal and solder and thumbtacks and who knew what else, "it's beautiful. It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen."

He grinned from ear to ear and punched her lightly on the shoulder. Well, lightly for Emmett. She tipped over from crouching to sitting flat on her ass. "You're just saying that."

"No," she said firmly. "I look at it, and all I can see is your heart, which is the most beautiful thing in the world. You made this, darling Emmett, with your body and soul."

"I also swore a lot," Emmett offered.

"It's the glue that holds it all together," smiled Rosalie.

"Well," Emmett shrugged, looking sheepish. "I just wanted to say thanks. I'm thankful every day that you found me. I'm even thankful for that motherfucker of a bear. I'm man enough to be proud to say my woman saved me, carried me miles when I was about to die. You saved me, baby. You." He kissed her on the nose.

"You're wrong," Rosalie said softly.

"What's that?" Emmett pulled away a little. He puffed out his chest. "Emmett is never wrong."

"Yes, he is," she murmured. "Because you saved me. You saved me by dying. You loved me even though I thought I was unlovable. You made me not curse eternity. You made me trust again."

"Well, I guess we'll have to call it even then."

"No," she said again.

"What _now_?" he whined.

"Well, you made this awesome sculpture. So now I have to make you a little something." She turned and wiggled her ass. She looked over her shoulder at Emmett, grimy and covered head to toe with metal shavings, grease, and spiderwebs.

He was still the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen.

He ran to her, fully intending to collide and possibly destroy the nearest unbroken pieces of furniture. But she dodged him like a toreador, and with lighting speed scooped him up as she did all those years ago, when she'd found him broken and bleeding. She carried him all the way to their room, laying him gently on the bed as if she were afraid he might shatter.

"You're my work of art," she said, brushing some of the grit out of his hair.

She carefully climbed onto the bed next to him, and they held hands, staring at the ceiling. She pointed out the constellations she'd found when she'd lain there alone. "They're all you," she said. "You're my heaven."

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**A/N: I still have drabbles, a one-shot, two pairs of Bella mittens, and up to four operafied songs available in the Fandom Gives Back auctions! Please bid on me! All info in my profile. I also whore myself out on Twitter (feistyybeden) daily with links.**


	9. Platonic

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Platonic**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Bella x Edward**

**Rating: K+**

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**Platonic**

His door was always unlocked, so I'd go in whenever. His roommates barely looked up from their homework. I'd tiptoe into his room—he took a lot of naps in the middle of the day. We had so much in common, liking the same bands, the same movies. He smelled nice. I'd curl up on his desk chair, waiting for him to wake up.

His breathing reminded me of the tide.

Sometimes I'd crawl by his side into his narrow twin bed, just wanting the comfort of another warm body. We told ourselves it didn't mean anything. We were wrong.

**

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A/N: OMG it's my first ever K+ story! Once again: drabbles aplenty for sale in Fandom Gives Back! Check my profile for links!**


	10. Jealousy

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Jealousy**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: M for darkety**

**Disclaimer: Not mine, not mine, not mine.**

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**Jealousy**

She was mine. She'd said so. She would always be mine. I knew it wasn't good for her; I knew _I _wasn't good for her. I knew she was too young to make such a commitment, one of _forever_. But she wanted it; she begged for it. And I was too weak to say no, even though I knew better.

Being around her was intoxicating. I had to hold myself in check, a mental suit of armor. I contemplated how close _armor _was to _amour_, just two letters away. I loved her enough to gird myself—not for my protection, but for hers. If I slipped, if I ever lost control … but no. I couldn't dare even think it.

Every day became a little easier. I trusted myself more. I became desensitized to her scent. If we were together all day, I barely had to think about restraining my movements, fighting my urge to sink my teeth into her neck. It was harder when we hadn't seen each other for a few hours. That's when her scent was potent again, when my fingernails would pierce my palms in my effort to control myself from lunging at her, snapping her neck, crushing her like a tiny, Venetian glass flower. I hated how much my body and my mind were at odds with each other. My mind was always stronger, but still I was ashamed for being so prone to my demonic, animal instinct.

Still, I wore my half-moon cuts on my palms with pride. Granted, it was only a matter of minutes before my skin welded shut again, but I welcomed the temporary physical pain, the knitting of my flesh back together. The pain meant I had controlled myself another day. I had kept her alive one more day.

And we continued in this way, her sweet devotion, her foolish daring to be around the most dangerous creature of all, as if I'd been sent from hell to destroy her. She was blissfully ignorant of the danger she put herself in daily to be around me. Her faith that I would not harm her was unshakeable. Daily I begged her to reconsider, as much as I knew it would kill me inside to lose her. But I loved her enough to let her go, to _want_ her to go. But she clung to me, telling me I was like oxygen, that she couldn't breathe without me.

I continually stressed how much I didn't want her to miss out on any human experiences because she was wrapped up in the dark world she never should have known about. I urged her to go out with friends, to make friends, to socialize without me. But she didn't want any of that. She just wanted me. Deep down, I was pleased. I'd never be able to ask her to spend all her time with me, but it gladdened me that it was what she wanted on her own. Even if my true self knew that she maybe didn't want what was best for her.

One day I went to pick her up after a library trip—she had a history project due the next week. I parked out front. I waited for some time, until finally I saw the lights shut off one by one. One of the librarians walked to her rusted-out car, and I waved her over. "Have you seen Bella Swan? About this tall, long brown hair?"

"Of course I know Bella. Yes, she was here, but she left about an hour ago."

"She did?" I scanned her thoughts, trying to see what she had seen.

In her mind I could see Bella, her head bent over some reference books, scribbling furiously into her notebook. I saw someone approach, someone I didn't know. He stumbled near her table, and, in trying to prevent himself from falling, he swept the large reference books to the floor. My Bella being a magnet for accidents, the books fell directly onto her foot. I saw her howl with pain. My foot throbbed in sympathy. My poor Bella.

"Is she all right?" I asked, panicked. In my anxiety, I forgot that the librarian hadn't told me any of what she had seen. All she'd said was that Bella had left.

She looked at me suspiciously, taking her car keys out and backing away. "Maybe you could call her, if you're so concerned."

She thought I was some kind of controlling boyfriend. Or that I didn't really know her at all. She was challenging me. She didn't think I even had her phone number. I ground my teeth together to try to keep my temper in check.

As she went to her car, I saw the rest: the young man apologizing, Bella flashing those glorious eyes of fury. She hadn't heard what the man had said to her, but they spoke, and then they left together.

_They left together_.

What did this mean? Was Bella in danger? I began driving around town, trying to find her through anyone's thoughts. After I'd run through a few red lights, I remembered that I could just call her on her cell phone. Right.

Speed dial. Ringing. Going to voice mail. Panic.

I increased my speed and drove in ever-widening circles around Forks. I couldn't sense anything. I couldn't see her in anyone's thoughts.

I tried calling again. Speed dial. Ringing. Voice mail.

Then, I admit I might have gone a little insane. I called the number over and over, hoping she hadn't heard the phone ring.

On the tenth call, someone answered. "Edward." I was so relieved to hear her voice that I forgot to be angry with her.

"Bella, are you all right?"

She stammered a little. She sounded nervous. "Yes, of course everything's fine." I thought I heard someone talking behind her.

"Are you in danger? Can you not speak freely?"

"Everything's _fine_," she said. "Don't worry. I'll see you tomorrow."

Tomorrow? Was she saying she didn't want me to come over tonight after Charlie went to bed?

"What about …" I began to ask.

"Edward, I'll probably be pulling an all-nighter to work on this history paper. You'll just distract me, okay? I'll see you at school tomorrow."

Her voice sounded strong, decided. I wouldn't push her.

But where the devil was she?

I raced home. Alice was waiting for me. "Bella's safe," she said, before I'd even opened my mouth. She had a guarded look in her eyes, though, one that suggested that she wasn't telling me everything she knew.

I tried to probe inside her mind, but she was reciting the periodic table to herself. Ah, the little tricks my family had picked up over the years to block me.

"Nickel is after cobalt, not copper," I said, stomping upstairs. Alice sucked at chemistry.

"You can't control her emotions, Edward," Alice called after me.

I had a bad night, worrying that Bella had lied, that she actually was in danger, or that she'd lied for … another reason entirely. And what had Alice seen? My fingers wouldn't stop twitching. I composed a sonata on the surface of my desk, not wanting to be around the others, not wanting them to hear my thoughts poured out through the piano.

I could hear some confused thoughts that my light was on, that I was here. I hadn't spent an evening at home in months. I tried to shut their thoughts out. If Alice wouldn't tell me what she knew, I didn't want to hear anyone else. I furiously pounded out chords, an angry Beethoven homage, not a charming Alberti-base Clementi piece of fluff. I cracked the surface of the desk.

I played all night. I saw the sunrise begin to creep in my window, pink and shy, reminding me of the bloom on Bella's cheek when she saw me the first time, the many first times she saw me. The pale sky reminded me of her translucent skin. I saw her everywhere.

I got to school hours early. I just couldn't stand to be around the others anymore. I sat on the hood of my car and waited.

I could hear Bella's old truck almost all the way from her house. I froze, my stomach in knots. As she parked, I saw her look at me. I could swear she rolled her eyes.

"Hey," she said, not raising her eyes to meet mine.

"Did you finish your paper?" I asked.

"I got a lot of it done," she shrugged. Then she smiled with a tight mouth and hugged me, pecked me on the cheek.

She wove her fingers through mine, and the day was back to normal. She seemed a little moody today, maybe tired from working all night. Sometimes I caught her looking past me with a faraway expression on her face.

"What do you want to do after school today, love?" I asked as we walked to the parking lot together.

She opened her mouth as if to say something but stopped. She thought a moment. "I still have this paper," she said finally, studying her feet.

"Do you need anything? Study break? Brain food?"

"I'll be fine, Edward," she said.

It went on like this for a week. Every day, that stupid paper. In school she'd act as if everything was okay. I wanted to draw her closer to me, but the more I advanced, the more she seemed to try to pull away. What had I done wrong?

After being told again that she'd be working on her history paper all night, I shrugged and pretended I didn't think anything was amiss. I watched her leave the parking lot. I waited until she was out of sight. I left my car and took off on foot, staying to the shoulders, creeping along the roads. It was easy to follow the noises of the truck. She drove down to a little creek past her house. I watched and waited silently, like a predator stalking his prey. I knew how to do this. I was made to do this.

She sat on a log and fiddled with her hair. I could smell her from my hiding place. I longed to put my nose at the nape of her neck. The way she raked her fingers through her hair, shook her head upside down, exposing the creamy skin of her neck, the languid way she put on lipgloss, rubbing her lips together slowly, teasingly … I took a lot of bark off the old tree that provided cover.

I was expecting another car, so I was surprised when I heard footfalls, whistling, and saw Bella's face in someone else's head. It wasn't like when I'd seen her in the minds of those foolish boys from school, Newton, Crowley, Yorkie. They were disgusting. The person's mind, whoever he was, was just … irritatingly good natured. Kind. Sweet. I wanted to like him as much as I wanted to tear his head off.

"Hey, Bella," he said.

She stood up, brushed the dirt off her jeans, and turned toward him. The look on her face turned everything to acid inside me. She was glowing. Her cheeks were rosy like the dawn. "Luke!" she said.

"You say that like you're surprised to see me."

"It's just nice, is all." She sat down again on the log, and he sat next to her. "I love it here," Bella offered, motioning her arms wide like she wanted to hug the world. "I love the way that creek seems to be telling me a secret."

He looked at her like he had found a part of himself. His thoughts were pure, excited, and genuinely full of love.

I could see the life he could give her. A _life_. A normal life free of danger. This was more the natural order of things. This is the way it should have been if we'd never come back to Forks. We shouldn't have come. I could see their whole lives ahead of them. I recognized the look in her eyes. She used to look at me like that.

I could see a little tinge of sadness about her, a tiny eclipse in the light in her eyes.

"What is it, Bella?" this human asked.

"I kind of have a boyfriend," she said. "But … he doesn't make me feel this way. It's different. You're so warm." She slipped her hand into his. "Everything about you is so warm. You don't treat me like I'm about to break. You squeeze my hand back."

"I don't want to cause any trouble," he said. "I mean, I can back off. You know, until you figure out what you want."

"No, that's not it," she said. "I already know. I just don't know how I'm going to tell him."

"Oh," he said, and I could feel real regret in him, sympathy for her boyfriend. Sympathy for _me_. He didn't even know me, but he felt sorrow and guilt that he'd be bringing someone else pain.

I couldn't watch anymore. I snuck back until I was out of earshot, and then I ran back to the school. I got in my car and drove as fast as I could. I was in Port Angeles before I realized that's where I'd been heading. I parked the car on a side street and just started wandering.

I saw her walking out of one of the bars, an Irish pub. She was a little drunk, swaying on her feet. Her hair was long, wavy, and about the same shade. I looked into her eyes in the moonlight. They were almost the same shade as well, but she was a cheap copy, a stunt double.

"What's your name?" she said, smiling at me, blushing a little.

"Edward," I answered, my hands in my pockets.

"Got a light?" She held a cigarette in her mouth.

I fumbled in my pockets for the Zippo lighter I'd picked up from a little tobacconist's in the 1940s.

"Thanks," she said, breathing in deeply and letting the smoke out of the side of her mouth.

"You're beautiful," I said.

"You're not so bad yourself," she said, winking.

I could see into her fantasies, so I knew what to say. "Do you want to go somewhere?" I said, offering her my arm.

I could feel the lust coming off her in waves, see her doing things to me in her mind. She dropped the cigarette and crushed it under her foot. "Mmmhmm," she happily hummed, looking at me through heavily lidded eyes.

She kissed me before we'd even walked past the pub. It wasn't like Bella. I didn't have to hold back, because I felt nothing. But she looked so much like her … or I could pretend she did.

She dragged me into an alleyway that smelled so strongly of piss and vomit that I nearly dry-heaved. I let her shove me against the wall. I let her kiss me, let her press her warm lips against my cold ones. I closed my eyes and pretended it was Bella, but it wasn't the same. Nothing was the same.

"Tell me," I growled in her ear, "would you love me forever? Would you never look at another man again?"

She grabbed my hair and pulled my head down to kiss her again. I was used to women reacting this way to me. But I heard her thoughts. I heard her laughing at me. She just wanted something quick, animalistic. I saw her mind scan through all the men she'd been with recently.

I thought of Bella. Bella and this new boy. This boy who could give her everything I couldn't.

I kissed Bella goodbye, not holding back, and I felt hands clawing at mine, frantic struggling, kicks that grew weaker and weaker. I felt her try to scream into my mouth as I kissed her. I heard whimpering, and then I heard nothing at all.

She lay lifeless at my feet, my handprints on her throat. Her eyes were bugged out, staring at me accusingly, even in death.

"Goodbye, Bella," was all I could say as I left the alleyway, got into my car, and drove as fast as I could.

I would never come back to this place. I could be in Canada in a matter of hours, maybe take a ferry to Alaska. I'd send a note to Carlisle later. He'd understand. Or maybe he wouldn't. I didn't care anymore.

I turned my headlights off so I could drive unseen, a nightmare hurtling by all those helpless souls in the darkness.

**

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A/N: Will I ever write a happy Edward/Bella oneshot? I don't know! Maybe? **

**Buy my ass for Fandom Gives Back! Links in my profile.**


	11. Raindrops

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Raindrops**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: T**

**Disclaimer: Not mine, not mine, not mine.**

**

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Raindrops**

It had been two weeks since the three of them had returned from Italy. She was still in a state of shock from all she'd seen, all she'd been afraid that would happen, all the heartache of the previous year. She was broken, just a shell of who she once was. She was glad that she'd been able to save his life—if that's what you could call it—and she ached for him, wanting to curl up in his arms and be protected by the concrete cage of his arms. But still, still, she realized that it wouldn't be enough. It wouldn't fix the hole in her heart. Her heart was like a shattered vase—you could try to glue it all back, but even so, there would always be shards that were missing. The pieces wouldn't fit exactly. It might look okay from the outside, from a distance, but if you filled the vase with water, it would leak, weeping through the invisible cracks.

Those little pieces of her heart were gone, maybe forever.

He'd wanted things to go back to the way they were, but she wasn't ready. She was glad her father had drawn such a hard line, had been harsh to the boy who'd sucked the spark of her soul as much as he'd once been tempted to suck the blood from her body. She knew she wouldn't have been strong enough to tell him no, to tell him to fuck off, to show him how much he'd hurt her by his lying, by his running away.

Her mind was so tired. She was so drained. Her body just _wanted_ him, no matter what he'd done. But there was that tiny part of her, the part she wished were larger and stronger, that said she deserved better. She wanted him to grovel, to take it all back, to erase her memory, or somehow to turn back time and make the last year not have even happened. She'd never be whole again, no matter how many apologies he uttered. That part wasn't strong enough to tell him these things, but Charlie was. He plainly said he didn't want to see Edward around after all the damage he'd done.

Edward foolishly hoped that Bella didn't feel the same way, that it was just Charlie being his usual overprotective self. But when he tried to sneak through her window the first night after they'd returned, he was shocked to find she'd locked it and pulled the curtains shut. He tapped on the glass lightly, and she responded by shutting off the lights, leaving him in darkness, crouched on the rain gutter of the Swan residence.

He understood, hopped down, and went back home.

She didn't leave her bed for days. Jetlag, she said. But she was thinking. She was wondering what she was going to do for the rest of her life. Wondering how long she could stay angry with him, and how long before she'd be able to forgive him.

Again, her body screamed, "Now, now, now!" Her skin tingled and stung just knowing he was so close and not touching her.

But that little hard part of her mind, stubborn and proud, said, "Not yet. You can't forgive him yet."

She lay in bed and fought with herself, body over mind, for hours. She knew being around him again would make her feel _good_ again, _happy_. But then that little niggling voice said, "That's not enough. It would help only for a moment." So she lay there, tossing and turning, twisting her bedsheets around her until she was tangled up in knots.

Charlie would check in on her, ask her if she wanted anything to eat. Sometimes she'd head downstairs for a quick bowl of cereal. And then back to her room to lie and think and think and argue with herself and think some more.

One night, there was another knock on the glass. She heard something at the window, and then she knew he was gone again. She could feel it. Her heart, cracks and all, still could tell when he had gone away. Curious, she went to the window and pulled the curtain back. There was an envelope wedged between the window and the ledge, her name in his beautiful script on the back, facing her.

She opened the window, and the letter fell. She watched it twirl in the moonlight like an autumn leaf. She closed the window and went to bed.

In the morning, she put on slippers and stepped outside to retrieve the letter. It had rained overnight, so the letter had grown soggy. The ink on the envelope had run. The envelope fell apart in her hands, and she had to open the letter inside carefully, peeling it open from corner to corner.

The letter was smudged as well. She could make out suggestions of words, but it was like a dream that you almost, but not quite, remembered. She crumpled the paper in her hand, letting it disintegrate to pulp in her hands. She wrung it out in her fist, looking in wonder as the water dripped from the mash of paper pulp, teardrop by teardrop, onto her slippers.

He was watching her, but far enough away that she didn't feel his presence, his magnetic north.

He watched her crumple the note, squeeze out its water, watched her turn around and return to the house. He'd waited all night for her to come and pick up the note, waited as the rain fell, soaking his clothes, dripping off the end of his nose, seeping into his eyes. When she went back inside, he turned around and went home again.

"When will she forgive me?" he asked his sister, who often could see things he could not.

"She needs time," was all Alice said in reply.

One night, Bella dreamed of him, of their meadow, of being alone and honest with each other for the first time. Such a perfect day. If she could have saved that one memory to be bottled and with her for eternity, she would have. She would have sold her soul to live in that memory forever.

_I love you, Bella_, she felt someone say through every cell in her body, neurons firing as if it were the Fourth of July. The vibrations were so strong that they shook her from sleep.

She woke up clear eyed and still. It was raining again, no big surprise, but this rain was different. These raindrops brushed tenderly against the roof like his eyelashes on her cheek. She went to the window and watched the rain streak down the glass, looking so much like tears.

She grabbed the light coverlet from her bed and wrapped it around her shoulders, creeping downstairs. She could hear Charlie snoring, and she knew he wouldn't wake up if she opened the front door and tiptoed outside.

The night was calling her.

She stepped into the rain, and the shockingly cold drops caressed her cheeks, like so many of his chaste kisses. She'd become used to equating chill with the fire of his love. That's how it came out in him, a cold burn.

She felt pulled into the forest behind her house. She barely noticed the mud and grass and branches under her bare feet, the edge of the coverlet dragging behind her like a mantle. The moon still shone through the rain, making her white coverlet glow. She walked slowly, regally, glowing like a fallen star. She felt as if she hadn't quite woken up. She wasn't afraid.

He was there, in a clearing in the woods, in the same spot where she had collapsed in agony when he had left her these many months ago. Was he real?

She wrapped the coverlet around her more tightly as the rain continued to mist her face.

"Are you here?" she asked, wondering if it were another vision.

"Always," he said, and they stared at each other as the rain blessed them, neither moving closer to the other.

Neither moved. They stood and stared, both still as statues, him not going to her unless he was sure she wanted him, her not going to him because she wasn't quite sure if she'd forgiven him. She wasn't sure if she could walk those last few feet, bridge the gap. They locked eyes, frozen, until she began to shiver from the cold.

He didn't ask for permission then—the urge to protect her was too strong. He could handle rejection, but he couldn't handle her discomfort or pain. He knew his cold body wouldn't provide any warmth, but it didn't stop him from trying.

He wrapped his arms around her, wrapped the coverlet more tightly, clothing her in white, in moonlight. He felt her shiver against him like a frightened bird, and he held her close, kissing her head, murmuring, "I'm sorry; I'm so sorry," over and over again.

She knew she was crying because the drops running down her cheeks suddenly felt hot. She was the glued-together vase, leaking from the cracks, as much as he tried to hold her pieces together.

She looked up at him, at the raindrops clinging to the end of his lashes like tiny jewels, liquid diamonds.

Her body vibrated from her chattering teeth, her quivering body, and he held her so tightly that he shook too. The drops that clung to his eyelashes fell on her cheeks, washing the hot saltwater away. He kissed her cheeks again and again in the rain, the cold and wet making her skin on his lips feel almost as if she were vampire too.

He let her shivers become his, and their bodies hummed as one in the stillness, the only sound the rain and his murmured apologies.

**

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A/N: Was that happy? Sort of? I'm feeling all New Moonish after going to the 12:03 AM premiere.**


	12. Touch

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Touch**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Bella x Edward**

**Rating: T**

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**Touch**

"Miss Swan, care to weigh in?"

I had been staring at the insides of my wrists, the purplish-blue veins just under the surface like a secret river in my translucent skin. I traced the river with my fingertip. I was a whole world with my own terrain, geography, and deeply buried secrets from lost civilizations.

"Miss Swan?" Mrs. Stanton clapped her hands sharply twice, as if she were calling a trained dog. The class snickered.

I didn't need a mirror to know I had flushed scarlet. My cheeks burned under the gaze of the classroom and my disapproving teacher.

"The, um, flower, the special flower Oberon sends Puck to get," I stammered. "_Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound_, that whole speech."

"And what about it?"

"He pities Helena for wanting Demetrius so much. She's desperate and stupid—she even offers to be his spaniel, his dog to beat and scorn." I clutched my hands together beneath the desk. I hated speaking in public. I addressed the vandalized desktop. "So in the end, are they really in love? I mean, it's just the flower that did it. He wouldn't have loved her otherwise. And how long does the flower's spell last? What if it wears off one day? What then?"

"Isabella, you are assigning modern-day, and, dare I say, typical teenaged concerns to your analysis. But the point that lies beneath your egocentric _who will love me _subtext is a valid one—perhaps Shakespeare was trying to illustrate the fickleness and … lack of _logic _in matters of love. For, after all, what does Puck say when he sees the human lovers bickering and falling in and out of love with each other? _Lord, what fools these mortals be!_"

I bristled at her armchair psychologist analysis of my reading of the text, but she was a bitter woman who'd had big dreams of academia ahead of her, gotten stymied writing her dissertation, and never finished her PhD. She was stuck teaching high school English in a public school in one of the smallest districts in the state, where, at any given point, at least half the student body was stoned. I almost pitied her. Almost. _Bitter old witch_, I thought to myself, clenching my jaw.

After the bell rang, I let her condescending droning float away from my mind and returned my thoughts to Shakespeare. I gathered my things dreamily, imagining a world where it would be so easy to make someone fall in love with you. What if it was that easy? What if all you needed to do was squeeze the juice of a flower into your love's eyes and make sure you were the first person he saw? I would travel the world to find this flower. I'd risk my life, swim a thousand seas, suffer through cold and ice and heat and fire, if it meant that _he'd_ look at me that way. What was the danger of death if it meant I could stop dying a little every day whenever I saw him and he looked right through me?

I put my bag on my shoulder and clutched my _Riverside Shakespeare_ to my chest as I headed to the cafeteria. The class was using the Signet Classics mass-market paperbacks, but I loved my _Riverside_ so much. It had belonged to my mom when she was in college. She'd died in a freak drowning accident when I was quite small. My mother, my own Ophelia. I should have feared the water after that, but I was probably small enough not to understand fully what had happened. Now when I'd go to the beach at La Push, I liked to think she was saying hello to me, that she was now part of the water, the waves lapping onto the shore. It was like when I'd read the original Hans Christian Anderson version of "The Little Mermaid," when he wrote about how mermaids faded and turned into sea foam after death. My mother _was_ the ocean; she was in any body of water. I would look at my reflection on the shimmery surface of a still pond and imagine it was my mother looking back up at me and smiling.

Of course I missed her; she was my _mother_. But children are resilient. I'd had to be strong for my dad, who wandered from room to room in our house like a ghost. He wouldn't get rid of her clothes or move the furniture or replace things that had gotten worn out. The house was like a mausoleum or a historical site, unchanged since the day she died. So even though my dad wasn't much of a reader, it had still taken some convincing for him to let me take her book from its place of honor in our living room bookshelf to my room. He probably feared the hole it would leave in the bookshelf, reflecting so perfectly the hole in his heart.

From what I remembered of my mother, she didn't believe in dumbed-down children's literature or television. She shunned the entire Little Golden Books series, anything involving the Berenstain Bears, anything with a Disney Princess on the cover. She'd read me _The Secret Garden_ or _Little Women_, a chapter a night, for my bedtime story. She'd also read me funny bits from her beloved _Riverside Shakespeare_, first reading the blank verse in her melodious voice, then translating it into words that I understood. I dreamed of lost keys and fairies and brave women disguised as men.

When she died, there were no more stories. Charlie wasn't exactly nurturing. He tried his best, but I couldn't ask him to read to me at night. Even at such a young age, I knew he wasn't up to it, to take up the role she'd left vacant. But I would crawl into his lap and push him to teach me how to untwist the black tangled marks on the page of his daily newspaper (mostly the sports section) or the _TV Guide_ into sounds, hard plosives, liquid consonants, long vowels, short vowels, voiced fricatives, and eventually into words and sentences. I followed his thick fingers tracing a path along the newsprint until they magically transformed into a language I understood.

As soon as I could read on my own, I asked Charlie if I could keep my mom's _Riverside_ in my room. He was torn between wanting to give me what I wanted and fearing that any change to the way _she _had left things would somehow erase another part of her. But in the end, his dad side won over his grieving widower side. I lugged the book up the stairs, resting the book every third or fourth stair, until I finally reached the top. Arms trembling under the weight, I paraded triumphantly into my room, the book held high like a trophy. I flopped on my bed with it, went through the book page by page, running my small fingers over the notes in the margins my mother had made in a former life. It would be years before I learned how to read cursive, but I loved knowing that there were still mysteries I would one day learn about her. She still had secrets for me.

I would lie on my stomach on top of my bed for hours, opening the book at random and sounding out the words, even if I didn't understand what was on the page. When I would recognize a passage after a few words, realize it was one she'd read and explained to me, it was like finding a pearl at the bottom of the ocean. I took such pride in reading it all by myself like a big, grown-up girl. I tried to remember how my mother had read the words, the cadence of her voice.

So when we began to study Shakespeare in English class, there was no way I was going to use the cheap, flimsy paperbacks issued by the school, not when I could bring a piece of my mother with me, to learn the way she had learned. The teachers quickly understood not to ask questions. There was a fierceness in my eyes that surprised them, maybe even scared them. I was so meek most of the time, so obedient, that this flash of defiance in me made them back off.

I'd carry the book in my arms as if I were giving my mom a hug. Sometimes my arms would get tired, so I'd put the book in my bag, the weight of it still a comfort to me, as if she were pressing a hand on my shoulder. She was with me.

I sat at my usual table in the cafeteria, alone, with the _Riverside_ spread in front of me. I knew the whole book practically by heart by now, but it was a good way to appear _occupied_, to appear as if my isolation were by choice. It also gave me a good cover to sneak glances at Edward Cullen at the next table. Ever since he and his family had moved here last year, I had known I'd never be the same again. I just knew. I wanted to believe that these swirling feelings flitting from ecstasy to nausea to self-loathing had to mean _something_.

In my darker hours, I had to admit that probably every other girl in the class felt the same way. I could tell from the way they'd look at him with moony eyes. The bolder girls would talk to him in the hallway, finding any excuse to touch him on the arm, laugh at jokes he hadn't made.

I wondered if he even knew my name.

"What would you do, Mom?" I'd whisper with my cheek resting on the thin, semi-transparent pages. I'd trace her notes in the margins with my fingertip. Sometimes I'd flip the book open to a random page, imagining that any notes on the page were messages from her, bits of advice or insight into whatever question was weighing on me at the moment. _Dramatic irony_, she'd noted on one page. _Tragic flaw_, I'd read when I'd asked her in my heart why I had fallen in love so hard with a boy who'd never even talked to me.

Today I let the book sit open in front of me. I cupped my head under my chin, my elbows on the table. I was thinking about the weekend, wondering when I'd next go to the beach to hear the waves pounding against the rocks.

"Heads up, heads up!" It all happened so quickly, the boys horsing around, throwing a Frisbee inside the cafeteria, Tyler jumping up to catch it, crashing into my table, and spilling my Coke all over my book.

I hadn't intended to, but I shrieked. I supposed I should have been more careful—I mean, eating with the book open in front of me was not exactly book preservation best practices. I realized the entire room was staring at me. I clapped my hands over my mouth and tried to appear calm, unperturbed. My vision grew blurry as I felt around the table for a napkin. It was lasagna day, so my napkin was already stained and covered with sauce. I didn't dare use it to wipe up the spilled soda. I dabbed at my eyes with it instead, no doubt getting red sauce all over my face. Fat tears splashed on the tabletop. God, I hoped no one was watching now.

"Here," I heard someone say, and when I dared to look up, Edward Cullen was there with a handful of paper towels. He was breathing a little hard, and I could tell from the light sheen of sweat on his forehead that he must have run across the length of the room to get the paper towels from the lunch lady. Maybe he'd even run all the way to the boy's bathroom and back.

"Thanks." I took the wad of towels from him and began dabbing the book. The pages were already buckling from the spilled Coke. Even if I got the paper dry, the pages would always be stained caramel.

"Is it going to be okay?" he asked gently.

I shrugged. I was afraid if I spoke, I'd start crying in earnest, and that was the last thing I wanted, to cry in front of this room of virtual strangers, and especially in front of the boy who turned my insides to mush.

"Mind if I sit down?" he asked. I shook my head, still pressing the paper towels to the book, assessing the damage.

He pulled out the chair, the legs scraping loudly against the linoleum. I cringed. "Sorry," he said. He was apologizing for the chair? I laughed.

"Don't laugh," he said.

"I'm sorry," I said, shaking my head. "It's just that, I don't know, were you apologizing for making a noise with the chair?"

"Sometimes I apologize for stuff," he said vaguely. He cleared his throat. "That book, it's important to you, isn't it?"

I swallowed hard a few times, trying not to let my voice shake with emotion. "Yeah," I said. "It was my mom's."

"Where is she?"

I thought everyone knew by now that I was the poor motherless Bella Swan. But of course, what reason had he to know my name, let alone my history?

"She … died," I said.

"Oh," he said, and when I snuck a glance at him, his face was twisted in a strange expression—embarrassment? Pity? I wasn't sure.

"It's okay," I found myself saying, trying to make him comfortable. "Old news." I shrugged.

"Which one's your favorite?" he asked.

"Favorite what?" I was having trouble keeping track of this conversation. Jesus, even the proximity of Edward was making my brain sluggish and confused.

"Play—that's a _Riverside Shakespeare_, isn't it?"

"Oh. Uh. I like them all," I said. "They're all kind of special, aren't they?"

"Huh," he said. "Most girls probably would have said _Romeo and Juliet_."

I ignored his gross stereotyping, because as much as I hated to admit it, he wasn't wrong. "I like _Othello_, but I wish just once that Desdemona would fight back or just hold onto her damn handkerchief in the first place. And that someone would punch Iago in the junk."

He laughed, and his eyes crinkled up so endearingly that my breath caught in my throat. "It's kind of sad though, isn't it?" he mused. "Othello loves her so much and can't imagine that she'd be faithful to him because he doesn't think he's worth it. He's so easily fooled."

"Mrs. Stanton would spout psychobabble at you about how you're projecting your own insecurities onto Othello."

"Mrs. Stanton needs to get laid," he said. I covered my mouth with my hand, hiding my smile. He caught my wrist gently and pulled my hand back. "Why do you do that?" he asked.

"Do what?" I said, a bit dizzy at his fingers encircling my wrist, so warm on my pulse points.

"Why do you cover your smile? It's pretty," he said.

I looked at my shoes and pressed my lips tightly together, a little private smile pricking up the corners of my mouth.

Suddenly I asked, "Why are you talking to me? Do you even know who I am?" The second the words were out of my mouth, I wanted to die. "I didn't mean it like that, like, '_Do you even know who I am, commoner?_'"

He didn't seem offended. "You're Isabella Swan, fair daughter of the sheriff of our fine kingdom. And I am but a poor pilgrim."

"Don't get goofy on me," I said, even though inside I was swooning and ready to faint like a delicate Victorian lady. "And besides, you're no pilgrim. Your dad is Mr. Fancypants Doctor. I guess that's Dr. Fancypants Doctor."

"Does that make me the Fancypants heir?" he asked, smirking.

"Yes. Yes it does," I said, and I was amazed how easy our conversation was. But then I thought about it too much and felt stupid and awkward all over again. I clamped my mouth shut, my mind totally blank except for a litany of all my flaws.

The bell rang, and I felt the self-hatred cascade through my body for not seizing this opportunity. When would he ever speak to me again? "I gotta go," he said. "I hope your book is okay."

"Thanks," I managed to get out. "Thanks for the paper towels, and for, like, not laughing at me."

"Why would I laugh?" he asked quietly as he turned and walked away.

The rest of the day was a bit of a blur. I replayed our small conversation, trying to understand what it all meant. I put Mom's _Riverside_ on my desk during the rest of my classes, thinking of Edward and opening the book at random to see if she were sending me a message.

I pictured Edward's face. Flip, flip, flip. My thumbnail scraped along the thin pages, sounding like a Vegas dealer shuffling cards. I felt a pull, so I stopped flipping pages and opened the book fully.

_Romeo and Juliet_, Act 1, scene 5:

_If I profane with my unworthiest hand  
This holy shrine, the gentle sin is this:  
My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand  
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss._

My eye flew to the word _pilgrims_. My mother had circled it twice. He'd called himself a pilgrim when we'd spoken. My face grew hot. Of course that's not what he could have meant. But my mother had sent me to that page.

_Of course she didn't, Bella_, I told myself, angrily slamming the book shut. _Mom's gone. She doesn't send you messages. She wrote that before you or Edward were even born_.

I hated when that voice got so loud. My childish supposing that my mother was still alive around me somehow was all that got me through most days. It was probably the only way my child's brain had been able to accept her death: by not seeing it as death at all. _He's not good for me_, I thought sadly. Tomorrow I would try harder not to let him mess with my mind so much. I didn't blame him, though. He wasn't doing it on purpose. It was just me, me and my longing. I, Helena-like, would beg him to let me be his spaniel. I would follow behind him like the love-starved dog that I was.

I couldn't let myself become that.

I wandered the hallway at the end of school, no longer clutching the _Riverside_ to my chest. It was in my bag, weighing on my shoulder. Today I didn't feel the weight as comfort, as a sign that my mother was all around me. Today it felt just like a burden.

When I got home, I put my mother's _Riverside_ back on the living room bookshelf. Charlie had never put another book in the spot. It may have been because he didn't really read books, or it may have been because he couldn't think of replacing any part of her. Maybe it was symbolic for him. So the bookshelf had stood with a gap in it like a missing tooth.

I ran upstairs to my room and tried to erase thoughts of Edward from my mind. How was it that having him actually _talk _to me, actually know my name, made me feel so much worse? I felt giddy too; my fingers tingled, my stomach flipped and twirled, my heart stuttered and stammered in my ribcage. But it was like a seesaw; as high as I felt thinking that I did exist in Edward's mind, I'd come crashing down as hard, thinking I meant nothing to him. He was nice. He was kind. He knew I existed, and it didn't matter to him. Ah, was there anything crueler than apathy?

I did my homework, fixed up supper for me and Charlie, and went back to my room. After I turned the lights out to go to bed, I crept to my window and opened it to the cool night air. The stars twinkled at me, and I couldn't help my childish self from seeing them as my mother winking at me, telling me goodnight. "Are you really there, Mom?" I whispered into the darkness. "Can you hear me? Or are you gone forever?"

I could have sworn I heard the sound of the ocean, but it might have just been ringing in my ears from the stillness of the evening.

I crawled into bed and tried to sleep, but my heart didn't feel right. I knew what was missing, and I tried to be a big girl about it, but after about an hour of tossing and turning, I gave up. I tiptoed downstairs to the living room and retrieved the _Riverside Shakespeare_. I hugged it to my chest as I climbed back up the stairs, the book sharp, cold, and angular against the thin fabric of my nightshirt. I placed it reverently on top of my school bag and immediately felt grounded again. So what if this made me a child?

I fell asleep almost instantly.

I dreamed of Puck flying with a purple flower in his hand, hovering over a field where a beautiful boy slept. I recognized his unkempt hair from my position high in the sky. Puck swooped down, reaching to brush the petals on Edward's eyelids. I knew it was a dream even as I slept, aware of my physical body in my bed with limbs heavy, eyes rapidly scanning from side to side. But even in a dream I didn't want it this way, so I alighted next to him, taking the flower from his hand and flying back into the sky. I crushed the blossom in my hand, the juice of the flower staining my fingers. I let the petals and juice drop from my fingertips, swirling in the air and landing harmlessly on the ground. "Let his mind be free, even if it means he'll never love me," I said to Puck, and he nodded, not saying a word, no doubt planning his next mischievous act.

I parked in my spot in the student lot the next morning as I always did. I had half a bagel spread with cream cheese in my mouth, and I climbed out of the truck cab absentmindedly. I clutched the _Riverside_ to my chest and was completely surprised when I nearly slammed into Edward, who was waiting by my car.

The bagel flew out of my mouth, falling cream-cheese-side down (of course) onto the asphalt.

Edward laughed. "Oh, god, I'm sorry. Do you want my granola bar?"

"Poor, sad, valiant bagel," I said, crouching down to throw it away.

"He'll give his life to feed some hungry birds, I bet," he offered. I considered this and decided to leave the bagel in the grass, just away from foot traffic. He watched me as I went from place to place on the lawn, trying to find the best spot to leave my fallen bagel. He stood at the edge of the grass with an amused expression on his face. It was sort of funny how he wouldn't cross into the grass, as if he thought he might disappear if he stepped over the threshold. Maybe the field was magical, full of sprites and spells, and he was too grounded in reality.

I couldn't decide where the birds might most appreciate my offering, and I felt embarrassed with the weight of Edward's gaze on the back of my neck, so I flung the bagel as far from me as I could. I brushed my hands off and walked back to the pavement, where I knew Edward was still watching me.

He held his granola bar out to me as my foot hit the asphalt, as I left the land of Faerie. "Madam," he said, as he offered me breakfast. He laughed a little, saying, "That was … an interesting method you used there."

"I'm sorry—I wasn't aware that there was a right way and a wrong way to throw a bagel to the birds," I said as I wrestled with the foil wrapper of the granola bar.

"It was just a little spazzy," he said, taking the package from my hands and opening it for me.

I blushed hard, as if it were my shirt he had peeled away, not a silly granola bar wrapper. "It was elegant," I argued. "I was an edible-discus thrower."

"You're edible?" he asked with amused eyes.

"That's not what I meant," I snapped. I added, "And of course I'm edible." Before I could stop myself, I launched into one of my favorite passages from _Othello_:

'_Tis not a year or two shows us a man.  
They are all but stomachs, and we all but food;  
They eat us hungerly, and when they are full,  
They belch us._

"Oh god," I said, when I realized what I'd been doing. "I'm the biggest dork in the world."

"The biggest _edible_ dork," he corrected, and I wanted to fall down on the sidewalk and die.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

Oh. I hadn't realized I'd squatted down on the sidewalk, praying for my death. "Nothing," I said into my knees. "Just slowly dying of shame, that's all."

He pulled me up to standing, his hands encircling my wrists gently. "Now why would you do that? Emilia is a bad ass, plain and simple."

"You knew what I was quoting?" I tilted my face up to meet his eyes.

"Please, I pull that line out all the time when my mom gets on my case for burping at the dinner table."

"Why _do_ you know so much Shakespeare?" I asked. I noticed his hands were still wrapped around my wrists, even though I was back to standing.

He shrugged, and I felt the motion travel from his shoulders, down his arms, and to his fingers around my wrists. "My mom is kind of nuts that way. You know how some parents do that Baby Einstein shit? My mom's been reading me Shakespeare since I was in utero."

"My mom too," I said. "I mean, she used to. Before … you know." I looked past him, to the wide gray sky, like bolts of cloth billowing in the wind. I jammed the granola bar in my mouth to have an excuse not to be talking.

I was concentrating so hard on not crying that I didn't notice he'd brought my wrists to his face. He brushed his lips over the inside of both of my wrists, and my breath caught in my throat.

"Definitely edible," he said. The shock of his lips on the sensitive skin on my wrists, my hidden rivers of life and blood, made my—his—whatever—granola bar fall out of my mouth to the floor. "You have to stop dropping your breakfast," he said, reaching down and handing me the granola bar. "See you at lunch?" he asked, heading for the building. "Second bell is about to ring."

I nodded, unable to speak, even if I hadn't had a granola bar in my mouth. I sat on the sidewalk, picking up the _Riverside _from where I'd let it drop when I discus-threw the bagel. I let the book fall open, hoping for a message from my mom.

_Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,  
Which mannerly devotion shows in this;  
For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,  
And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss._

It was the same scene from _Romeo and Juliet_ where she'd circled the word _pilgrims_ twice. Now I noticed a note in the bottom corner of the page. _Sexy flirting_, she'd written. I smiled to myself around my mouthful of granola.

I traced the insides of my wrists again, where his lips had been but a second ago. The second bell rang, and I scrambled to my feet and ran to homeroom, my hair trailing behind me like a sail. I felt my heart beat hard against Mom's _Riverside_, and it was as if the book were beating back at me, alive.

* * *

**A/N: Happier? This is about as fluffy as I get. Also, the Riverside Shakespeare is hella sexy.  
**


	13. Juvenile

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Juvenile**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Jane**

**Rating: M for mild naughtiness and the blindness that comes from non-canon pairing**

* * *

**Juvenile**

He saw the small girl sitting on a rock at the top of the hill at the edge of his backyard. _Must be the new kid next door_, he thought. He thought he'd be neighborly and introduce himself. She was curled up into a little ball, her unbrushed hair cascading down her shoulders. She was shaking. Was she cold? Was she laughing?

"Hey, hi," he said, huffing a little from the effort of climbing the big, grassy hill. "I'm Edward. I live next door, I think. Your folks just moved here?"

She looked up at him with shockingly big eyes, wet with tears. He took a step back. She was no kid—she was just small for her age. Her body was that of a child's, but her face was etched with the pain of a girl on the brink of womanhood.

"Oh!" he said in surprise. "I thought you were …" he trailed off, not knowing how to say it without offending her.

"Younger?" she spit out. "Were you going to pull a quarter from behind my ear? Buy me an ice cream cone?"

"Uh, erm, no," he said, shuffling his feet and scratching his head.

"Then what, _Edward_?" she asked with such viciousness that he could respond only by shoving his hands deep in his pockets.

He fought the urge to run. He didn't want her to know she had gotten under his skin. "What's wrong?" he asked, chin up, trying to be brave.

"Aren't you going to run away? Leave me? Leave the little girl?"

He couldn't think of anything to say in the face of such hostility. "I don't even know your name," he offered lamely in excuse.

"Jane. It's Jane." She put her head back on her knees, hiding those big blue eyes from him.

"Hello, Jane. It's nice to meet you," Edward offered, trying to be polite like his mom had taught him.

She laughed coldly. "Really nice, I'm sure."

Edward's patience had worn thin. "What is your _deal_?"

"My _deal_?" she said, imitating his intonation perfectly.

"I'm just trying to say hi and make friends, and you're just trying to cause as much pain as you can."

"Oh, am I _hurting_ you?"

Edward sighed. "Why are you crying?"

"I'm not crying," she said.

"Yes, you are."

"Fuck off."

"Charming," he said, turning to go.

He was halfway back down the hill when he heard a small voice call back to him, "Please don't leave me. I'm sorry."

He stopped, his back toward her. Should he keep walking? She was really the most unpleasant girl he'd ever met. But now she sounded so pained. He had such a tender heart; he couldn't stand anyone in tears. His mother was always calling him a big softie. He certainly couldn't walk away from someone who needed him, even if she wouldn't admit it.

He took a deep breath and turned back around, bracing himself for more abuse.

When she opened her mouth to speak, he winced.

"You're afraid of me now, aren't you?"

"A little," he admitted.

She laughed, and it wasn't mocking. It was a genuine, gentle peal of laughter.

"I'm a bitch," she said, shrugging.

"Always try to excel at everything you do," Edward said, and she laughed more, flipping him the bird.

She wiped her wet face on her sleeves. "What do you do for fun, Edward?"

"Talk to mean girls," he said, grinning.

"You're _wicked_, aren't you?" she asked, hopping off the rock and looping her arm through his.

"Not so much," he shrugged.

"I'm wicked," she said. "I'm so wicked we had to move far away."

"How old are you? You don't look old enough to be wicked."

"I wasn't aware there was a legal age requirement for wickedness," she said, narrowing her eyes. "I'm fifteen."

"Me too," Edward said. "But I'll be sixteen soon, and I'll have my license."

She rolled her eyes.

"What?" he asked defensively, pouting a little.

"Mr. Bigshot with his license, ooh, I'm so _impressed_."

"Well, forget about hitching rides with me then." He ran his hand through his hair, puzzled, and asked again, "What makes you wicked?"

She shrugged. "I think I was born this way. I don't want to be wicked, but it's so much easier than anything else."

"Why did you have to move?"

"Can you keep a secret?" she asked, leaning toward him.

He nodded solemnly, tilting his head so she would whisper in his ear.

"I'm a slut," she whispered, then licked his ear.

He jumped back, not ready for her quick, pink tongue. "Well," he said, pretending to scratch his head but wiping her saliva from his ear, "what does being slutty have to do with anything?"

"When you're slutty with one of your teachers, maybe one who is married? And whose daughter is in your class? And you get caught _in flagrante delicto_ by his wife, who is on the PTA? Sometimes that can be a problem."

He swallowed hard. He wanted to play it off cool, but he'd never met anyone like her. His friends were into D&D and video games and trying to sneak into R-rated movies. "Oh?" he asked, trying to sound casual, but his voice cracked.

"Go home, little boy," she said, and he complied, vowing to Google "in flagrante delicto" as soon as he was back in his room.

***

"Mom?" Edward asked as he came into the house. "What do you know about the new neighbors?"

She'd already been by with a "welcome to the neighborhood" pie. "They're nice, I guess," she said. "They've got a girl about your age. She's going to be in your class, I think."

"I met her," he said, shivering. "Her name is Jane. She's … different."

She sighed. "They mentioned something about … well, she's a handful. Not sweet like you." She ruffled his hair.

"Don't, Mom," he said, smoothing it back down. He remembered the feeling of Jane's hot tongue in his ear, and he didn't want to be _sweet_. He wanted to be a little wicked.

***

Edward was lying on his stomach on his bed, his laptop opened in front of him, and his eyes widened as he read what _in flagrante delicto_ meant. Wow. No. She couldn't _really_ have done all that. He tried to picture the scene, Jane twisted around this big old married teacher guy, his wife coming in … he was embarrassed at how turned on he was by the thought of the girl with the face of a child but the mind of a devil wrapped around his own waist. He shifted position, his pants uncomfortably tight.

He shook his head, physically trying to dislodge the seedy images from his brain. He was not like her. He brought a hand up to his head, tracing the path her tongue had taken in his ear.

He went to sleep dreaming of those big blue eyes, that red, heart-shaped mouth saying, "Edward, you're _wicked_."

***

He saw her again, sitting on the rock. Without being asked, he ran back up. "Hey, Jane," he said when he was a few feet away. He didn't want to startle her.

"Hello, little boy," she said, grinning at him as if she could see he'd been dreaming of her all night.

"What?" he asked, cheeks flushed. He was trying very hard to prevent unwanted boner. He had a feeling she could sense any boner in a fifty-foot radius. "My mom said your parents called you a 'handful.'"

"You were asking your mom about me?" she asked, eyebrows quirked.

"No! I mean, she volunteered the information," he said, not making eye contact.

"I bet you look into my bedroom at night from your room. I bet you sit there with binoculars in a chair with the lights off, and you try to catch me in my bra."

"No! I … Jesus." He was flushing, and the boner threat level was dangerously high.

"It would be okay, you know," she said, starting to unbutton her blouse.

"What are you doing?" he asked, ashamed that mind-over-boner hadn't worked.

"It's what you want, isn't it?"

He put his hands in his pockets, attempting to pull his pants forward enough to hide Situation: Boner. "No!" he shouted with perhaps too much protestation.

Her eyes flicked down to his pants. "Your mouth says no, but your pants seem to say yes." She got up and slithered toward him, placing her hand on Situation: Boner. "Yep. Definitely saying yes." She began to unbutton his pants.

He took a step back, tripping over his feet and landing square on his ass. The ground was damp, and soon he could feel wetness seeping through his pants, through his little-boy briefs. "Is this who you are? Who you really are?" he asked, slowly getting up to his feet.

"I told you; I'm wicked."

"I don't think so," he said quietly, making sure to keep her from seeing the wet spot on the butt of his pants from where he'd fallen.

He advanced slowly. They locked eyes, his green ones on her big blue ones, so large and innocent looking, like the glass eyes on a sweet baby doll. She licked her lips, waiting.

He held her arms to her sides and asked, "Did you really sleep with your teacher?"

She didn't say anything.

"Did his wife really walk in and catch you two together?"

Her lip quivered.

"I'm wicked," is all she said.

"No." He wouldn't accept it.

She began crying again. "Fuck you, Edward. Fuck. You." She struggled against him, trying to free herself.

"You're not wicked," he said, boring into her with his gaze. He wasn't even sure what was propelling him to act this way. "You're too young. You can't know how to be wicked."

"They say I am," she whispered.

"I say you're not."

"I lie," she said.

"About what?"

"Everything."

"Is your name even Jane?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Did you move here because you're wicked?"

"Kind of."

"Did you sleep with your teacher?"

She bit her lip, struggling with something in her mind, finally shaking her head. "His daughter told the whole class I was a virgin. So I started a rumor. I never said a lot. I just put suggestions in people's heads, and they told themselves the rest. They saw what they wanted to see. Their souls are so black. It wasn't hard. He was fired. I don't know if he'll ever teach again."

"Are you proud? Are you glad?"

"I didn't want to be the class virgin," she said, daring him to condemn her. "They already made fun of me for being so small."

He let go of her arms so he could hug her to his chest. He was scrawny and awkward and not sophisticated, but he was warm, and he was earnest. "Does anyone know?" he asked.

"Just you and me," she said into his t-shirt.

"You're not wicked," he murmured against her hair, wishing he had the guts to kiss her, even just peck the top of her head.

"Don't be so sure, Edward," she said, turning her face to the side, being extra careful not to make eye contact.

The wind whipped around them at the top of the hill, and they stood there like entwined trees until Edward's mom called him in for dinner. He untangled himself from her and began to walk down the hill without a word.

"Bye, Edward," she called after him.

He nodded, hands in his pockets. "See you in school."

She sat back down on her rock and watched him disappear into his warm little house, glowing, she imagined, with light and love. She hugged her knees to her chest. "Thank you," she whispered, once he had shut the door behind him.

**

* * *

A/N: Yes, Edward x Jane. Yes. This is a special gift for Spargelkun. I hope this is not too angsty for you, Spargel. If you like, you can imagine that they hang out in school, and then they do "homework" in "Edward's" "room," and eventually find out how "wicked" they each are. "Repeatedly." With "lube."**


	14. Voracious

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Voracious**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Jake x surprise guest star**

**Rating: M (for lots of wrongness)**

**Disclaimer: I really own none of this except the crack.  
**

* * *

**Voracious**

Jacob was patrolling the woods between Forks and the Rez. Goddamn, he loved running. It was even better knowing he was completely naked. "I'm running, freeballing, and it's totally legal, motherfuckers!" he said in his head as he let out a triumphant howl.

"Ew," he could hear Leah thinking. "Dude. Why do you have to remind me? I don't want to think of your flopping junk."

"I'm Alpha! I can command you to think of my flopping junk!" he thought back at her.

"You suck—did you know that?" asked Leah.

"Come on, guys, stop _fighting_," said Seth. "You guys are worse than an old bickering married couple."

"Seth, don't you love the freeballing? The feel of the wind on your wrinkly scrotum?" Jacob was trying to win Seth over to his side.

"Well, yeah, that does feel really kind of awesome," Seth had to admit.

"I hate you guys," thought Leah. "I'm phasing back, mofos. And I'm going to be naked. How you like that, bitches? Naked with my boobs in the cold night air, and oh? What could that be? Am I on my period?"

"I'm going to barf," thought Jacob.

Leah snickered. "You can dish it, but you can't take it, can you, you stupid mutt?"

"If I'm a mutt, you're a … a … mutt on the rag. And ew. Do you leave a trail of period blood behind you? And don't you stop, you know, having your monthlies when you go werewolf?"

"_La la la la la la la_ my sister doesn't have ladyparts _la la la la la la_!" sang Seth in his head.

"_I'm freeeeeeeeeeeee!_" sang Jacob in his head. "_Freeeeeebaaaaaalliiiiiing!_"

With a pop, he knew Leah had phased back. She was no longer in his head. "Hey, Seth, guy, you can phase out too," he said. "Things have been quiet around these parts for a while. Why don't you go home and eat something?"

"Not if Leah's going to be there," thought Seth, shuddering.

"You know what time it is?"

"What?" Seth bit at the back of his neck. Some stupid little chigger thought werewolf would make a tasty midnight snack.

"Skinemax time, baby."

"Oh! Skinemax! Mom's over at Charlie's, which, ew _la la la la la _also not thinking about."

"Why don't you get your boobie fix on?" asked Jacob kindly.

"Yeah. Boobies. Man, I love Skinemax." And with another _pop_, Jacob felt alone in his thoughts.

_Run, run, run, run, chuff, chuff, chuff, freeball, freeball, freeball_. Yeah, being a wolf was awesome sometimes.

Jacob looked up at the clear night. Full moon. Third night of the full moon. He smirked to himself, thinking of the silly Palefaces' version of their legend. _How dreadful to be beholden to the pull of the moon_, he thought. _We might have that stupid imprinting thing, but at least I can choose when and where to phase_.

Suddenly all the fur on the back of his neck stood on end. Someone—or something—was nearby. He closed his eyes and tried to listen hard, sniff the air. Didn't smell like vampire, or like wolf, or like human. What else could be out in the woods?

He heard an anguished wail, and he didn't think—he just ran toward the sound. A wild dog, perhaps? He came to a clearing in the woods and saw some sort of half-man, half-beast. It was furry, with bared fangs, and the strange, lanky body of a stretched-out man. _Baroo_? he thought, his head tilted to the side. The creature lumbered around, humanoid arms dragging in the dirt. The head, though, that was definitely some sort of wolf head.

The creature didn't seem to see him, but Jacob wouldn't let it—correction, _him_, wow, what a set of balls on that guy—out of his sight. He watched as the beast howled in frustration. Jacob could hear the wolf-beast's stomach growling. This poor thing was starving. He wondered what he might eat. He hoped not humans or werewolves. He was pretty sure he could take on this starving thing, but still, the unknown made him a little nervous.

He padded silently, although his cautiousness probably wasn't necessary. The beast was so out of his mind that he was making a hell of a commotion breaking low-hanging branches. The beast flushed out a raccoon from some shrubs and pounced. The raccoon didn't have a chance. In two seconds the beast had it in his maw, tearing the flesh off the raccoon's back. He held the raccoon by its tail and nose like a furry corn on the cob and went to town on it. It took only a minute for him to pick the unfortunate raccoon clean.

Jacob tailed the ravenous creature all night, and when the sun began to rise, he was amazed to see the emaciated beast transform before his eyes into a frail little man. Starkers, of course. As a human, his balls were still impressive, although Jacob noted the cold night air hadn't done any favors to the guy's Johnson. _Poor Paleface_, he thought.

Jacob hid behind a tree and phased back, untying the bundle from his leg and slipping on his cut-off jogging pants. Thank god for Old Navy sale rack. He and his buddies went through these bad boys like a hooker went through coldsore ointment. He stepped carefully over to the naked sleeping dude. Jacob nudged him with his toe. "Yo. Yo, buddy. Get up."

The man said something like, "murfle," rolled over, tucking one hand between his bare thighs, and began to snore again.

"Dude, you can't sleep here. Also, some hikers are bound to come through here, and you really don't want them to see your pale, pimply ass. Believe me." He bent down and shook him by the shoulder.

"_Expelliarmus_!" shouted the man, half asleep.

"Expel me a what?" Jacob asked, crossing his arms over his twelve-pack abs.

"Oh. Oh, dear me, dear me," the man mumbled. His hair was stringy, his eyes crazed. "Please don't tell me I've harmed anyone! Why didn't I drink my potion?" The man appeared to be British and completely dotty.

"Calm down, bro," Jacob said. "All you did was suck a raccoon dry. I watched you."

"Oh dear, oh dear," he kept mumbling. Jacob was reminded of the White Rabbit from _Alice in Wonderland_. "I don't suppose you have any chocolate on you, do you? It helps; it really helps sometimes."

This dude was making no sense at all. Was he some kind of pedo? Jacob wished he had a shirt. He felt so exposed. He didn't like this guy looking at his nipples, even though they were perfectly socially acceptable boy nipples.

Jacob was not comforted when the man began looking him up and down. He took a few steps back, trying to cover his chest as best as he could with his arms. He looked like Botticelli's _Birth of Venus_, but more butch and Native American.

"Oh, dear boy, please don't tell me I've bitten you while I was … I was in my state."

"No, like I said, all you did was eat a raccoon."

"Good, good, good," he muttered, fingers twitching nervously.

"You are going to have to explain yourself, or I'm going to start punching things. And by 'things,' I mean 'your face.'"

The man sighed, pushing himself up to sitting. Jacob was grateful the man had the modesty to cross his legs and fold his hands in front of his junk. "Well, I suppose since you've already seen me at my worst, I can tell you the truth." He raised his hands and yelled, "_Obliviate_!"

Jacob cringed at the man's re-exposed dangly bits. "Dude, are you _high_?"

"Drat, drat, where did I put my wand?" the man muttered.

_Great, now he's referring to his junk as a _wand_? _thought Jacob.

The man resumed his more modest position. "Well, as I cannot locate my wand, I suppose the truth is the only thing remaining."

"The truth would be refreshing, bro," Jacob said, still trying to hide his boy nipples.

"I know this will be hard for you, a mere Muggle, to accept," the man began.

_What did he just call me? Is that some sort of Brit Native-American slur I don't know about?_ Jacob was ready to be offended, maybe punch this guy in the nose.

"But I—yes, I know you will have trouble believing this—I am … oh, I just cannot say it! I cannot!"

Jacob was fed up. "For fuck's sake, man, just spit it out!"

"Very well, but as neither of us has chocolate, I do not bear responsibility for any harm that may come over you due to fainting at my shocking revelation." He cleared his throat and swallowed hard. "I, dear boy, am a … a …" Here he dropped his voice even though there was no one around for miles. "I am a … _werewolf_."

Jacob fell over laughing. "You have _got _to be shitting me," he said between guffaws. "You? You pansy limey Paleface?"

"Excuse me? I am a full professor! Or was … or … I don't remember. You should fear me."

"Pale-wolf-thing, you are not a werewolf. You are not of my lineage, and you are not Chosen." He'd gotten over his initial laughter and now was ready to be proud and offended. That this sad, foreign pedophile type should claim to be a _werewolf_ like he and his brethren … it was ludicrous.

"I … I am _so_ a werewolf," the man insisted. "Check my robe pockets for my Magical-Medic-Alert bracelet." He patted at his ribs. "Oh drat, I'm naked, aren't I?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Oh dear, oh dear," he said again, wringing his hands. "Well, I am Remus Lupin. _Lupin_, do you get it?"

"Uhhh, should I get something?"

"Do they not teach you Yankee Muggles Latin anymore? Such savages."

Jacob bristled at the word _savages_. He had this _Lupin_ by the throat, pressed against the nearest tree. "Do _not_ insult my people, especially on my land."

"Pardon," Lupin choked out. "Please. I don't know how I got here. I … do beg pardon. No offense, truly. I'm just a bit addled—the transformation drains me so."

"So you really think you're a werewolf?" Jacob asked, slowly releasing his grip on Lupin's neck.

"I _know_ I am," he said sadly. "If only it were a delusion. Every full moon, unless I take my special potion, I turn into a wolf, vicious, voracious. If I bite a human, that human is cursed as I have been, as I will be, for every full moon."

Jacob snorted.

"It's no laughing matter, you insolent child!" Lupin hid his face in his hands.

"What kind of sad-ass werewolf are you?" he asked.

"I … I was not aware there were different kinds," said this Lupin.

"It just so happens that I am, too, a werewolf. But I can change whenever, and it is kind of awesome. Also, it's an honor, a privilege, to be of this bloodline. It's not a curse or a disease. It's also not _contagious_."

"I'm afraid my news has made you insane," said Lupin, shaking his head. "Poor child. I do apologize. Perhaps I can take you with me to Madam Pomfrey; she may be able to fix you a draught of something restorative."

"Pedo, I'm not going with you anywhere or drinking anything you or your froufrou buddies give me. And I'm not insane. You're the insane one."

"No, I assure you, I am a werewolf."

"And I'm telling _you_, pasty dude, I am also a werewolf. But way more badass than you."

"I'm afraid I've never affected anyone this way before," muttered Lupin. "Oh, how shall I make this right?"

Jacob rolled his eyes, slipped back out of his jogging pants cutoffs, and phased into a wolf. Lupin fell backwards, bare ass in pine needles and branches.

"Merlin's pants!" he said. "Son of a Deatheater, I sat on something prickly!"

Jacob phased back into human form and put his pants back on. No need to give the pedo a free show.

"Believe me now?" he said, once again covering his manipples with his hands.

"Why, that's remarkable!" Lupin winced as he brushed pine needles off of his ass. "You seem in complete control of your wolf form."

"Uh, _yeah_. Also, I look like a _wolf_ when I do it."

"What? Don't I look like a wolf?"

"Erm, not so much. Hate to break it to you, bro, but you look like cheap-ass BBC special effects."

"Son of a Deatheater!"

"Look, let's get some clothes on you. You hungry? You look hungry. One sad little raccoon isn't going to make much of a dent in a true werewolf's appetite. Come on." Jacob clapped the naked man on the shoulder. "It's going to be just fine. Can you run?"

"I don't have my good trainers here," he said sadly. "I'm rather … nude."

"Uh, right. Hold on." He took his pants off, phased again, and ran through the woods. He was back in a flash with a bundle in his mouth.

He phased back _again_ into human form, put his pants back on. He untied the bundle. Inside was another set of Old Navy sweatpants cutoffs. "Here, guy. Put these on. Cover your shame."

Lupin turned the clothes over and over in his hands. "How odd, your Muggle clothing."

"I have no idea what _Muggle_ means, but I don't like the sound of it, Paleface. So you're going to stop using it, _capisce_?"

Lupin was too busy trying to get his wobbly legs inside the cutoffs to respond. "Well, this wouldn't be my first choice, but my, it is nice to feel my testicles just free inside this soft fabric. Is it dragon's down?"

"Uh, cotton/poly blend, maybe?"

"Fascinating, fascinating," said Lupin, running his hands up and down the cutoffs. "I'm afraid I didn't pay enough attention during Care of Magical Creatures. What mystical animal is this cottonpolyblend?"

Jacob just shook his head. "Bro, let's get breakfast. They have that where you come from, right?"

He led the strange man back to the Clearwaters' place. Sue was back from her Paleface booty call and was making a mess of pancakes.

"It smells delightful!" clapped Lupin as they came closer. "Might you also have pumpkin juice? Perhaps some butter beer?"

"We might have Sunny D, maybe? Maybe grape drink?" Jacob wasn't sure he had done the right thing, bringing this strange man to La Push.

Jacob coughed loudly as he entered the Clearwaters' house. "Guys! Hey! I found this weirdo in the woods last night. He says he's a werewolf, but he's more like, I don't know, some kind of sad wolfman."

Leah rolled her eyes so hard that it was almost audible. "Jesus, Jacob, you drag that rubbish into our house?"

"He was hungry! And I saw him phased last night—he's definitely not _normal_. Not just human."

Lupin was already standing by the stove, jamming pancakes into his mouth. "Poor dear," clucked Sue, in full-on mothering mode. "Let's get you into some warmer clothes and maybe some shoes."

Lupin rejected Harry Clearwater's clothing, declaring it too "odd," opting instead for a big housecoat of Sue's. "The fabric isn't exactly what I'd choose, but I like the cut of the garment," he said, turning and admiring the back of the housecoat in the full-length mirror.

Leah, Jacob, and Seth exchanged glances, but Sue merely nodded, glad her guest was fed and warm. She went to her bed to have a lie down. Her Paleface boyfriend had worn the hell out of her last night.

"So," Jacob said, looking to his packmates once Sue had closed her bedroom door behind her.

"So," said Seth.

"So," said Leah.

"What do we do now?" asked Lupin. He discovered the housecoat's pockets. "Oh! How delightful! Pockets on the _outside_! This would be handy, although it's too shallow for a wand."

Seth and Leah stared at Jacob, who shrugged.

"Well, it's Sunday, yeah?" asked Jacob.

The others nodded.

"Old Navy should be open by now, and we haven't hit the sale rack in a good week or two."

"Old Navy!" said Seth, clapping his hands.

"I could use some new yoga pants," sniffed Leah.

They piled into Jacob's Rabbit and drove the familiar path to the Old Navy. "Come on, strange man," Jacob said as he parked. "We'll show you how it's done."

Lupin wandered behind the three, drawing plenty of stares with his orange floral housecoat. "Stay with the group!" hissed Leah as Lupin was transfixed by a display of mannequins.

"What strange enchantment is this?" he murmured. "Why do they stand so still? Why does their hair appear so … solid?"

"Come _on_," Leah said, shooting a glance to Jacob. They dragged him to the sale racks at the back of the store.

"So, the first rule of werewolf club is _we don't talk about werewolf club_," said Jacob.

"Please, that joke is _so _ten years ago," said Leah.

"There's a club? For werewolves?" Lupin exclaimed.

"No," said Leah. "Jacob's just idiotic."

"_Anyway_," said Jacob, "the first thing you need to do as a werewolf is to have a large array of sweatpants, cheap, so it doesn't matter if you cut them short or if you bust out of them when you phase. We like to phase with these tied to our leg. That way, when we phase back to human, we have clothes. None of this naked-human-in-the-woods business."

"Ingenious!" said Lupin. "Now, what's the exchange rate for Galleons to this funny S with the lines through it?" He patted the housecoat's pockets. "Oh, drat, those were in my robes too. Is there a Gringotts branch nearby? Those transaction fees can be such a pain in the bubotuber."

"Gring-what's?" asked Jacob.

"Oh dear," said Lupin, furrowing his brow. "Well then, can you spot a brother … however much this is?"

"We got it," said Seth.

When they checked out the cashier looked the familiar three over warily. "You guys again? Do you resell these pants on eBay or something? And who's your weird friend?"

"Less talk, more check out," said Leah, snapping her fingers in her face.

The cashier mumbled something under her breath about "freaky Old Navy pants cult" but didn't say anything else to them.

When they got back to the parking lot, arms loaded down with Old Navy bags, Lupin reached his arms wide, gathering the three into a big hug.

"My friends! My dear friends! Thank you for the gift of these magical cottonpolyblend pants! I shall never wake up naked again!"

There was a loud popping noise, and a petite woman with crazy hair stood in front of them.

"Remus!" she cried out. "We've been looking all over for you! How did you end up here?"

"Not sure … stumbling in the moonlight … must have been a portkey," muttered Lupin.

"Well, let's get you home, darling."

"Yes, Tonks," said Lupin. He swung his Old Navy bag triumphantly. "These wolves here, they have taught me so much! Cutoffs! Old Navy! Magical creatures! Sunny D!"

"Oh, honey, you're delirious," said the woman, laying her hands on his temples. "Hold on, sweetheart." She turned to Jacob, Leah, and Seth. "Thanks for taking care of him. He's not well."

"Obviously," snorted Leah.

"Goodbye, friends, brethren. May we one day meet under happier circumstances." He hugged them again, slapped their backs. "I shall never forget this, the gift of … pants."

And with another _pop_, the two strangers disappeared.

"The fuck?" asked Jacob. He turned to Seth. "Well, how was the Skinemax?"

"Skinemagical!" said Seth, pumping his fist in the air.

"I hate you guys." Leah rolled her eyes again, pulled her shirt off, and slithered out of her pants. Seth turned away, but Jacob tried to sneak a peek at her goods. Seth punched him in the arm.

Jacob looked away too, giving Leah the privacy to phase. When they turned around, they saw her lithe wolf body run toward the woods back toward the Rez so quickly that the Old Navy bag tied to her hind leg was just a bright blue and yellow streak.

"Want to stop by Hooters on the way home?" asked Jacob.

"Helllllls yeah!" said Seth, sliding into shotgun.

* * *

**A/N: Uh, yeah, I have no idea.**


	15. Sky

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Sky**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Carlisle x Esme**

**Rating: K+  
**

* * *

**Sky**

The children were out for the evening, and Esme and Carlisle were curled against each other in front of the fireplace. "How long have you known me?" asked Esme.

"A little less than a century; you know that."

She smiled, tracing his lips with her finger. "Longer, I think. A past life."

"Centuries?"

She shook her head. "I think we've always been together: I the earth, you the sky, and before I was awake, you gazed at me with those twinkling eyes."

"I loved you before you were alive," said Carlisle.

"I loved you before I was born," said Esme.


	16. Crusade

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Crusade**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Alice x Jasper**

**Rating: K+**

* * *

**Crusade**

"If I were tied to the railroad tracks by a mustache-twirling man, what would you do?"

"I'd untie you a split second before the train came."

"If I were stolen away by fairies, what then?"

"I'd steal a baby to offer in your stead."

"What if I were institutionalized?"

"I'd pretend to be crazy to be near you, and I would break us out."

"What if a vampire got there first and changed me?"

"I'd hold you until you woke up again and beg you to take me."

"What if I kissed you hard, like this?"

"I'd believe in God."


	17. Wood

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Wood**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: T**

* * *

**Wood**

He was lonely. He was the only one who hadn't found a mate. His siblings were happy and in love, as were his parents. They lived in a giant house in the middle of a thick forest. They rarely went into the town, being able to purchase anything by Internet. It was best to avoid people directly.

It was Valentine's Day, a silly human tradition. But his family adored it—what better than a day where expressing their love of each other was mandated? They'd give each other chocolates in heart-shaped boxes, knowing they wouldn't be able to eat the sweet treats inside. They'd buy perfume and filmy scraps of lingerie and sports equipment and new cowboy boots.

His mother would always buy him a little gift as well—after all, romantic love wasn't the only kind of love there was. "Thanks, Esme," he said as he opened up the small package, a heart charm on a gold chain. Did she expect him to wear it? He coughed, although he had no physical need ever to cough. "I, erm, this is a bit feminine, isn't it?"

"Oh, Edward," laughed Esme. "It's not for _you_. There's a change in the air. That necklace belonged to my great-great-great-great-grandmother. From what my mother told me, she had great powers. Some people called her a witch. The necklace has been passed down from woman to woman in my family. I felt her in me last night. The necklace is for you, but not to wear. That's all I know."

"Right. Thanks," he said, shoving the necklace into his pocket.

_Go to the wood_, he heard in his head. Esme? No, it didn't sound like her voice. He scanned the air around him, listening with his inner being. It was not a voice he recognized. These were new, unknown thoughts.

_Go, Edward_, the voice said again.

"Do you hear that?" he asked Esme.

Esme shook her head, and Edward heard her silent worry. _I wish he weren't so alone_, she thought.

Edward started going to his room, but the voice said, _Don't you listen, boy? To the wood!_

He turned on his heel and went out the back door. There was no point hanging around the house today anyway.

The voice in his head was louder and rather bossy. _This way. Two steps north. No, _north_, you simpleton_. He found it easier to close his eyes and go where the voice commanded. He could focus better on the odd directions.

_You're almost there_, the voice said, and he walked purposely forward, colliding with a tree.

He opened his eyes angrily. Why was he listening to weird voices in his head anyway? Just because he was a 109-year-old virgin was no need to act like a crazy old lady with a million cats. "Might as well learn how to crochet doilies," he said to himself.

The tree he'd slammed into seemed to giggle, but it was just the wind. He took a step back. What a lovely tree. It looked almost like a woman with arms reaching for the heavens, its green, leafy branches like thick, lustrous hair.

His undead heart almost skipped a beat. _I've gone completely batty_, he thought. _I'm so lonely that I'm finding flora kind of hot_. _Who was that king? King George? Did he talk to trees?_

He sat a bit away from the tree on a fallen log. The tree danced in the wind. _Set her free_, that bossy voice said.

"How?" he asked the air.

He walked toward the tree again and began to scratch away at the bark with his indestructible fingernails. The bark chipped away easily, until the trunk was bare and pale. It was lovely and seemed to glow with its own light.

He longed to set the light free, let it spill out from every crevice. He dug at the wood with his nails, his teeth. The wood was soft, almost like flesh. Soon he had a pile of wood pulp, branches, shavings at his feet. He could almost see a face, a beautiful face hidden in the tree, like those crazy people who find the Virgin Mary in a grilled cheese sandwich.

Bonkers. He'd gone completely bonkers. He shouldn't have been surprised, really. A century of isolation … even if he lived among beings just like him, it would take its toll eventually.

He touched the face in the tree gently. _If being crazy means I can see this kind of beauty, then let me be insane_.

_The necklace, boy, hurry_, said the voice.

His hand flew to his pocket and fished out Esme's great-to-the-nth-degree-grandmother's necklace. He was glad he was alone; he felt like a jackass as he reached around the tree trunk to fasten the necklace.

There were branches extending below the beautiful face, preventing the necklace from slipping down the trunk like a loose garter. He sat back down on the log and looked at his tree. The necklace swayed in the wind, and it seemed as though the face in the wood smiled.

"Hi," he said, feeling foolish.

The tree shook its leaves in response.

"I love you," he said, surprised by his own impetuousness.

There was a sound of cracking wood like a farmer splitting logs with an axe, and Edward was nearly knocked backward from a sudden burst of light. He blinked hard a few times and stood up slowly.

There was a slight maiden standing in front of him where the tree had been. She had long, flowing brown hair nearly to her waist, and she was naked save for a small gold necklace with a heart dangling from its center.

"Are you real?" he asked.

She lowered her eyes, a mysterious smile on her lips.

He stepped forward cautiously, slipping his arms out of his jacket. He draped it over her shoulders to cover her nudity.

He waited for her to speak, but all he heard was the wind rattling the leaves.

"I don't care," he said after gazing at her face. He embraced her, expecting cold, rough planks against his hands, his cheek.

She was warm. She was soft. She was breathing.

"Thank you," she whispered in his ear.


	18. Mirror

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Mirror**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Jessica**

**Rating: M for bad decision-making**

* * *

**Mirror**

I hate my face. I hate everything about it. My nose slopes upward, my teeth seem really horsey, and I have man-eyebrows. Manbrows. I try to do damage control with makeup, but what's that saying about putting lipstick on a pig?

I guess I'm the pig in this scenario.

I'll stand in the bathroom for hours when I'm home alone, looking at myself in the mirror. Sometimes I even talk out loud to myself. "Who could possibly love you?"

It's funny; if someone were spying on me through the bathroom window, they'd probably think I was completely vain or something. It's the opposite, really. I obsess over my reflection because I think I'm so hideous that I can't look away.

My mom says shit like, "Oh, you're beautiful just by being young. In twenty years you'll wish you had what you have now."

Maybe that would be true if I were hanging out with a bunch of fifty-year-old broads, but when everyone around me is beautiful _and_ young, I've got nothing.

My hair's all right, I guess. It's long and shiny, but it frizzes up in the humidity, and _hello_, Pacific Northwest, _always humid_. Sure, it takes an hour to straighten my hair before school, but that's better than showing up like Bozo the Clown.

Fucking clowns.

I'll be honest: I try to distract people from my face with my rack. Low-cut tops are buddies of mine. I have even tried that "Bend and Snap" routine from _Legally Blonde_. (For the record, it doesn't work when you are Jessica "Horseface" Stanley.) I watch infomercials in the middle of the night, hoping I'll find the magic product that will make me beautiful.

Do you remember that lady in France who got the face transplant? I wonder what I have to do to get on the transplant list. Do you get to pick whose face you get, or do you get just whoever died? Do you get to see the face first and pass on it?

It's Friday night, and my mom's out with her Friday night bridge club. I think they are eating sandwiches with the crusts cut off, pretending they are high society when really they will never be anything more than small-town poseurs.

Mom doesn't like me to wear the low-cut shit I'm always wearing. I'll put on a cardigan or drape a scarf or something when I leave the house, and as soon as I'm at school, I ditch the extra layers. I worked one summer at Sharon's Floral Designs, and most of my job was peeling off the dead and damaged petals on the roses. She called them "guard petals." I think of those layers as my guard petals, except once you peel them away, I'm not a beautiful rosebud. I'm still … me. Stupid, flawed me.

Since Mom is out, I don't bother with my guard petals. I don't know where I want to go. I put on some stripper heels and a bustier and my tightest jeans. I look at my reflection, turning this way and that. From the neck down, I look great. When I look at my face, I sigh. I wonder if people would like me better if I wore a paper bag on my head.

I slick on bright red gloss, put on heavy eyeliner, and dust some blush on—the whole works. The makeup should make me prettier, but I still frown at myself in the mirror. Even with my hair tamed, I feel like a clown in garish makeup.

I walk outside, going to the planter where I stash my contraband cigarettes. The light's on next door. Mr. Hubert and his dying mom moved here a few weeks ago. My mom said I'm not supposed to bother him. He's strange, that's for sure. I hope that when I'm his age, I'm not still living with my mother.

I walk down my driveway as I light my cigarette, letting my hair fall over one eye, imagining I'm prettier than I am. I exhale slowly, pretending I'm a forties film star. Maybe in black and white I'd be beautiful.

Mr. Hubert is sitting in the front room. I can see him on his couch, an afghan on his lap. His face is lit up by the TV. I inhale wrong and start coughing. He looks up at the noise and sees me. His eyes behind his horn-rimmed glasses are bug-like. I watch him watching me, drinking my image in. He licks his lips like they are parched.

He stands up, and I can't see him through the window anymore.

I turn around and continue walking to the mailbox at the end of our shared driveway. Mom's already checked the mail today, but I still want to look. Maybe she forgot something. Maybe there will be a note for me, one slipped in by a secret admirer. I tell myself this every day. I'm such an idiot.

The door creaking open behind me stops me in my tracks. Mr. Hubert casts a long shadow onto his porch. He looks like a giant beetle silhouetted against the bright lights inside. "Hey, hey, girl," he says, his voice squeezed, his breathing labored.

"I have a name," I say, my hands on my hips.

"Do you, pretty girl?" he wheezes.

I start walking toward him. Something in my gut is screaming to stay where I am, but I keep walking anyway. _He called me 'pretty.'_

"It's Jessica." I keep walking toward his house, swinging my hips a little, trying to be sexy.

"Pretty, pretty Jessica," he says, holding onto the doorframe. I spin for him under the porch light. I can feel his eyes on me, greedy and strange.

My heart flutters, but my stomach feels cold.

"Do you want to come in for some lemonade?" he asks.

Do I? I don't, really, but no one has ever looked at me like this. "Okay," I say with uncertainty, teetering a little on my heels as I climb up his porch steps. "Is your mom sleeping?"

"Always," he says, and he looks so sad that I almost want to hold his hand.

He motions me into the house, and I look around, curious to see the inside of the house I've always lived next to but never been inside. It looks just like my house except flipped, and it smells all wrong. It smells like illness, like dying. I can hear whirring and beeping of medical equipment.

I can hear him puttering around in the kitchen that is a mirror image of ours. I take a slow turn around the living room and look out the front window, trying to imagine what I looked like to him as I stood out there. What made him get up and come to the door? Does he really think I'm pretty? I can see my reflection in the windowpane, a ghost version of me, and I try to see myself through his eyes. I scrunch my eyes up, blurring my vision, trying to see loveliness.

Ice cubes jangle by my ear, and I jump at Mr. Hubert's proximity. He's holding a highball of lemonade, his hand shaking from age or nerves. "Here," he says. "I hope it's cold enough."

I take the glass from him and cross my arms around my middle.

"Aren't you going to drink?" he asks, looking at the glass in my hand. His eyes linger on the way down to the glass, stopping a little at my collarbone, the exposed skin on my chest.

I raise the glass to my lips and take a polite little sip. He's watching me so closely. His gaze burns my face.

He coughs, shifting his weight from foot to foot. He's just swaying from side to side, not saying anything, just _staring_. I'm suddenly uncomfortable.

"I … should get back," I say, striding to the kitchen to put my glass in the sink.

"No, please," he says, grabbing my arm and yanking me back. The glass falls out of my hand and onto the carpet. The carpet fibers drink up the lemonade greedily.

I try to wrest my arm free, but he's surprisingly strong. I wonder if he has to help his mother in and out of bed.

"Let me go!" I scream.

As soon as my voice rises, he drops my arm as if I'm on fire and shrinks back. "I'm sorry, Jessica. I'm so sorry," he says, his body language once again meek and pitiful. "I don't know what … did I hurt you?"

I rub my arm. I can see a pale handprint where he gripped me. "I'm fine," I say, backing up, not taking my eyes off him.

"You're so beautiful," he says, and I shake my head, wondering why he is the only one who has ever told me so. I look at the tipped-over lemonade glass on the floor, the damp carpet, the handful of melting ice cubes.

"My mom's expecting me," I lie, and I slip out the door, stumbling down the porch stairs. I think I can hear him crying as I run out into the night.

I dash through my house's open door and slam it shut. I lean on the door hard, breathing raggedly. I flip the deadbolt and run to the bathroom. I take a tissue and rub off my lip-gloss. I wet a washcloth and scrub my face until it glows pink.

I take a few breaths before dialing my mom's cell phone number.

"Jess, you know I'm busy," she says, irritated, as she answers the phone.

"Mom? Mommy?" I say. "Can you come home?"

"Of course, sweetheart," she says, her tone warming up as soon as she hears my shaking voice.

I sit in my room with the lights off, looking out the window until I see her car pull in.

"Jess? Jess, honey?" She sounds worried as she unlocks the door.

I run downstairs and into her arms. I don't know why I'm crying.

"It's okay, baby. I'm here," she says.

I realize as I feel her hands on my bare skin that I haven't changed out of my slutty clothes. I'm going to be grounded.

She doesn't mention my clothes, though. All she does is stand up and go to our kitchen in our proper house, not flipped, not reversed, everything going the right way. She comes back with a pint of ice cream and two spoons. We sit on the steps and dig into the pint of butter pecan.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she asks. I shake my head. "I'm always here, you know," she says, and for the first time, I believe her.

When we scrape the last of the ice cream from the bottom of the pint, she strokes my hair and says, "Why don't you go to bed?" I nod and climb the stairs, leaving her sitting there with an empty container and two dirty spoons.

I go back to my room and sit in my old rocking chair. My mom used to sit in this chair and rock me when I was a baby and couldn't sleep through the night. I draw my knees up to my chest and look at my reflection in the full-length mirror against the wall.

In the moonlight, my face glows. I reach up to touch my face, and I look so much like a phantom that I'm surprised when my hand touches warm flesh.

"You're beautiful," I say to my reflection, but neither of us believes it.

* * *

**A/N: What happens after this? Well I can tell you that Mr. Hubert is troubled but harmless. Jessica is safe. She makes some bad decisions, goes out with some mean boys, but figures it out after a few years. Just not here, where I've left her. No, she never is alone with Mr. Hubert again. And yes, it was on purpose that I named him "Hubert," one letter off from "Humbert."**

**Oh, ****and don't try this at home, kids. If the creepy next-door neighbor invites you in and calls you pretty, run the fuck away, okay? Promise me that.**

**I'm going to have to drabble my ass off to finish these 25 by the 1st. Crappity.  
**


	19. Plea

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Plea**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Jasper, Edward, and special guest (not slash)**

**Rating: T**

* * *

**Plea**

"Don't hurt me!" the man cried out, but his mouth didn't move. The crown on his pompous hair quivered in fear as he looked from predator to predator.

"I'll give you _anything_," he whimpered.

"Don't think so," drawled the blond one. "You used our likeness to sell your product."

"I … I didn't!"

"Let's look at the tape again, shall we?" said the one with the copper hair. He clicked a remote control. The clip rolled, and the man knew he was doomed.

"I'm just the spokesman," he sobbed.

"Vampires don't eat hamburgers!"

The Burger King wept, awaiting his death.

* * *

**A/N: Seriously, these commercials confound me.**


	20. Worship

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Worship**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: T**

* * *

**Worship**

She didn't say anything as he slid the bra straps from her shoulders, undid the clasp. She trembled, never taking her eyes off him. He touched her as if she were a relic and he a pilgrim who'd traveled the world, sandals covered in dust.

He ran his nose down her exposed skin and drank in her scent, the sweetest incense.

She blushed, never having been naked in front of a man before, but he knelt and kissed her feet.

"Don't be afraid," he said, his eyes shining with wonder.

"Never, with you," she said, reaching out to bless him.


	21. Vivid

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Vivid**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Alice x Jasper**

**Rating: K+**

* * *

**Vivid**

I wandered the streets aimlessly, hiding my face from passersby. How had I gotten here? I'd been living hand to mouth, stealing clothes from clotheslines. Thankfully I didn't need shelter or sleep, and wildlife was plentiful.

But what kind of life was this?

_Technically, it's not _life_ at all_, I thought bitterly.

The buildings were grimy, gray, monochromatic.

Suddenly my head split open; the city melted away. His face was bright in my mind, so much color spilling out I believed I'd found Paradise.

He was to be the center of my universe. I just had to find him first.


	22. Sour

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Sour**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Mike x Mike's Fragile Ego**

**Rating: M (for language and douchery)**

* * *

**Sour**

Things were just fine before the Cullens came. I was the cock of the walk, emphasis on _cock_. Oh yeah. I knew what it felt like to have varsity cheerleaders undress me with their eyes, and, after a big victory, their mouths and tongues and sweet, sweet snatches. Okay, maybe they didn't undress me with their snatches, but snatchery was definitely involved at some part of the evening. They couldn't get enough of the Newton. They called me "the Plumber" because I laid so much pipe. But then those pale weirdos came in with their perfect skin and sparkly teeth and bouncy, shiny hair, and suddenly girls looked at me like I was something they found on the bottom of their shoe. That is, if they looked at me at all.

Two of the dudes were off the market, but it didn't help that the hottest one (_okay, I admit that the Cullen with the reddish hair is a bit more supermodel than the others—it doesn't make me any less butch—shut up_) was single. Yeah, he was good-looking—I couldn't deny it. But, damn. He was such a stiff. He was head of _Chess Club_ for Chrissakes. _Chess. Club_. And yet, even though I was on every damn varsity sport in our sad, sad school, it was _Edward Cullen _this and _Edward Cullen _that and _Edward Cullen oh my god my panties are so wet, did you see the way he fingered that rook in Chess Club_. Oh my god. I felt like the fucking Mayor of Crazytown.

I might not have been _GQ_ pretty, but I was decent, man. And I had a personality. Chess Dork Cullen just brooded, but I guessed chicks found that hot. He wouldn't talk to anyone except his family. I saw Jessica throw herself at him day after day, waving her ta-tas around like she was Charo or some shit.

She used to do the Charo routine for me.

Chess Dork Cullen, or _CDC_ as I liked to think of him in my head, totally brushed her off. Actually "brushed her off" is probably a bad way to describe it, because he didn't come anywhere near her first-class mammaries. What the fuck was his problem? Sure, she was the Community Chest, but those were fine knockers. You had to respect the knockers, even if half the school had already checked them for ripeness.

He was creepy, plain and simple. I could swear that sometimes when I thought about him (no, not in, like, a gay way, but more like a seething resentment way), he would look at me with the spookiest-ass expression, like he'd like to make a vest out of my skin. Serial killer, man. Mark my words. That dude was a killer. Maybe not now, but soon. One of these days. I'd bet he had a basement full of dead stray cats or something. He smirked at me sometimes, and it gave me the chills.

The whole school was abuzz today because there was going to be fresh meat—first fresh meat since the Cullens came and ruined everything. Rumor had it that the police chief's daughter was going to be here for a while. Now, I'd had a run-in or two with Chief Swan—dude had a weird sixth sense about when high schoolers had a keg in their parents' basement. I figured his daughter would be like him: pale, dark hair, maybe a mustache. Ropey muscles. Man hands. I don't know.

But _she_ walked into the hallway, her hair blowing in the wind behind her, the pinkest cheeks, no sign of a mustache. Maybe she bleached. Maybe she waxed. Or maybe she was some kind of goddess. I tripped over my feet to say hi. "I'm Mike, Mike Newton," I said with my hand stretched out. Now, I liked to gauge a lady's handjob skills by her handshake. The Chief's daughter's hand was limp like a fish. _Virgin_, I thought, and then I was overwhelmed with daydreams of showing her the ropes, the _thick, ropy ropes of the Plumber_.

She said her name was Bella. She was so pure and perfect that I couldn't wait to take her for a spin, if you catch my drift. I knew what to do. I'd be super friendly to her, show her around, tell her how the school was run, and maybe I'd make enough of an impression before moody, emo CDC could horn in on my territory—territory he didn't even fucking want, freak who didn't know good tail when it gave him a fucking lap dance in the lunchroom.

I walked her to her first class and was waiting for her at the end of the second. I pulled her chair out for her, showed her what a perfect gentleman I could be. Oh, the subtext was there all right. _See how I take care of your undercarriage?_ I pushed her chair in, letting my crotch almost graze her face on my way out. Yeah, the Plumber was _in_.

I couldn't wait for lunch. Bella was going to sit by me—I'd make sure of that. Maybe I'd even offer to get her lunch for her. A girl like her probably wouldn't eat much. Maybe, like, one stalk of celery. The wallet of the Plumber could handle that much. I'd even splurge for a Diet Coke. Yeah, I was smooth.

Bella came into the cafeteria, and Yorkie was already hovering at her shoulder. _Aw, hells no_. I strode up to them. "Bella! How's your first day?"

She shrugged. "I'm, uh, not used to this kind of attention," she said, her eyes cast down. She was so hot that she didn't even realize she was hot. I could dig that.

"Bella, now I don't do this for everyone, but I'd like to get your lunch today," I said, gesturing to the lunch line behind me. "As a special 'Welcome to Forks High' dealio."

"Oh," she turned away. "You don't need to do that." She blushed the most delicious shade of red.

I draped my arm across her shoulders. "Of course I don't. But I _want _to." I flashed her my awesome smile. I didn't sparkle, but the Newton pearly whites were hard to resist.

She smiled and nodded her head. "Thanks. That's … really, like, cool of you."

She was so predictable with her Diet Coke and an apple. Yeah, the Plumber could bankroll that lunch, no problem. I carried her tray for her like a gentleman, led her to our table. I pulled the chair out for her, and she shook her head and laughed.

"You Forks men are classy," she said.

"That's right, babe," I winked. Yorkie made gagging sounds, so I kicked him under the table.

Bella twisted the apple stem in her hands.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

She looked down, confused. She laughed. "Oh, god, it's an old habit. You're supposed to twist the apple stem and say the alphabet, and the letter the stem breaks off on is the first initial of the person you're going to marry."

I took my apple and twisted the stem. I pulled the fuck out of it on the second twirl. "_B_ … would you look at that?" I said, sliding my chair closer to her and presenting her with the severed apple stem.

Yorkie did that thing where you fake-cough. "*Cough*douchebag*cough*."

Bella laughed—wait, _with me or at me_? I couldn't tell. I could feel my balls retreating into my body in defeat. "Nice," she said with a smirk. Okay, it was with me. Possibly. The balls descended again. Cock of the walk. The Plumber was _back_, ladies.

"Now you," I said, tossing her apple to her.

She shook her head, her hair tumbling sexily around her face, and I imagined those brown waves tickling my bare chest as she gave the Plumber's snake a little how-do. I gave her my best puppy-dog eyes. "Oh, Jesus, fine," she said. She twisted the stem and recited the alphabet.

It broke off on "E."

Yorkie got out of his chair and did a victory lap around the table. "In your _face_, Newton!" He bellowed, "ER-ic YORK-ie," and clapped, one, two, one, two, three. He put his hands on the back of my chair and started singing "We Are the Champions," shaking his girly hair and swaying from side to side.

I turned swiftly and flicked him in the balls.

"Not cool, bro, not cool," he said, wincing and grabbing his junk.

Bella's face changed, not smiling and laughing. She had a lost look on her face. "Who are they?" she asked. Oh crap.

Jessica said, "Oh, those are the Cullens." She shrugged. "They don't talk to any of us."

"Who's the boy on the end?" she asked, trying to sound casual, but I knew.

"Edward," said Jessica almost reverently.

"Edward," repeated Bella with a dreamy look on her face.

Motherfucker! I was so damn close. I angrily popped open my can of Coke and guzzled it down. The Coke sloshed around in my empty belly, acidic, probably eating away at my stomach lining. Cockblocked by CDC _again_.

I watched Bella brush her apple across those full, delicious lips, and I could tell she was imagining getting it on with CDC.

_I want my two dollars back_, I thought, looking at her lunch tray.

* * *

**A/N: THE END IS IN SIGHT OMG.**


	23. Retribution

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Retribution**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: T**

* * *

**Retribution**

I saw their thoughts; I knew what they wanted to do to her. _Yes, but you're guilty of the same_, I chastised myself.

Their fantasies danced behind my eyelids, taunting me. She was beside me, and I couldn't stop seeing those sick—tantalizing—images. Fuck. _Get out of my head_.

I dropped her off at the restaurant where she was to meet her friends. Once she was safe, I went back.

I found them.

It wasn't breaking the treaty if I didn't feed off of them. I snapped their necks, relished each scream.

But I still couldn't stop the images.


	24. Soft

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Soft**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Alice x Jasper**

**Rating: T**

* * *

**Soft**

I could still see every single face, every life I'd taken in my bloodlust. They whispered to me wherever I walked. _Killer. Monster. Demon._

How could she love me, knowing what I'd done?

How could she love me, knowing what I was still so tempted to do?

_Children_. I killed _children_. Their ghosts tugged at my clothing as I walked by. _Why?_ they asked, bewildered.

"Get away!" I shouted, breaking into a run.

But she found me. Always.

"Hush." She held me to her chest, humming sweetly, soft hands tangled in my hair.

I melted into her, my undeserved salvation.

* * *

**A/N: ZOMG ONE MORE TO GO.**


	25. Light

**The Twilight Twenty-Five**

**Prompt: Light**

**Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden**

**Pairing: Edward x Bella**

**Rating: T**

**Disclaimer: Not mine, not mine, not mine.

* * *

**

**Light**

They always tell you that you see a bright light when you die. I don't know what I believed, before. I once had a dream that I saw the face of God, and it was so blinding and golden and bright that my whole body hummed with an unearthly joy. When I woke up, I felt cheated, somehow, that I had to return to my ordinary life after my brush with the divine.

When they first told me I was sick, I didn't believe them. I was seventeen. Teenagers are supposed to live forever. I didn't _feel_ sick. Sure, I had some dizzy spells, and sometimes my feet would go numb, but I was just Bella the Klutz. That was my _thing_. But lying inside the MRI chamber, boy, that really makes you think about eternity, eternity in a box. I shivered in my cotton gown and thought of all the things I'd never get to do. It was real then, the clattering and banging, like my disease was trying to get at me and the chamber was the only thing keeping it away.

When Charlie and I sat with the doctors afterward, they showed us scans on the screen and used big words, and I tuned them all out. I couldn't believe it was really happening. Their mouths moved, flapping like puppets, but they weren't talking. It was just noise, like the clanging inside the chamber. I could tell Charlie was trying not to cry, and that made me sadder than any of the rest of it. It still didn't feel real to me. It was like I was watching a melodramatic made-for-TV movie about a young woman who had my face, tragically stricken with MS. I patted my dad's hand and said, "I'm going to be just fine. Don't worry about me." It must not have been the right thing to say, because he shut his eyes tight and clenched his fists even tighter.

We hadn't wanted anyone at school to know, but of course we had to tell the administration in case something happened during school hours. But they were all small-town gossips, and it wasn't long before everyone was treating me like a leper. "I'm not contagious!" I wanted to scream every time someone shied away from me in the hallway. My friends could barely talk to me—shit, they couldn't even look me in the eye. Things got so serious the minute I stepped into their conversations, like they were afraid that being happy would somehow offend me. "It's okay, guys," I'd say at lunch. "Just be normal around me. Please. I just want things to be normal." And they'd try halfheartedly, and that was even worse when they said nothing at all.

I was taking photography that term for my art credit requirement (_if I even live until graduation_, I'd think during my darker hours), and I never went anywhere without my 35mm Leica, a gorgeous little camera that had belonged to Charlie's dad. I started hiding behind the camera. _Camera obscura_, a camera predecessor had been called, Latin for _darkened room_, which reminded me of being in the MRI chamber. I'd be taking pictures of life around me, of happiness spied from a distance. With the barrier in front of my face like a hunting blind, people would act a little more normal, because I wasn't part of it.

Just like I wouldn't be part of it someday.

_No_, I'd tell myself, _don't think like that. You don't know. People live for decades with this disease_. But still, damn. I wished for the days when my biggest worries were having a zit on picture day or not having a date for prom. God, my troubles then were all so petty, and now I just wanted to be able to walk without stumbling or tingling. Just _walk_. How had I taken it all for granted before?

I enjoyed my time in the school darkroom though, hiding in the little closet to wind the spool to develop the film, shaking the steel canister once I'd poured the developer in. It always amazed me—what an act of faith, to fumble in the dark and feel around with your hands, hoping you'd wound the spool correctly, and then taking the film out afterward and seeing tiny pictures where before all you'd had were memories of what you'd spied for a fraction of a second through the lens.

I liked examining the film on the lightboard with a loupe, seeing the images of my friends in the negative, lips strangely white, skin purplish and alien. I wondered if that was what forever would be like, a life with flipped colors, everything like our world but just sort of different. The light from the lightboard was florescent white, cold and unfeeling, not like the golden light of the sun, but it was the manmade light that let me see the most of the negatives, decide which ones might be worth blowing up.

Edward Cullen was in my photography class. I'd been watching him for years. He never spoke. The nice thing about his always having been silent and dour was that there was no discernible change once word of my illness got out. He was constant. He made me feel normal—well, invisible, as he always had. But with the amount of change I was facing daily, it was nice to have something be the same as from before, when I was Just Bella.

I was always in the darkroom, and he spent a lot of time there too. He was kind of a loner. We'd sit at tables near each other, the only sound the water in the stainless steel sinks to rinse the chemicals out of the prints. Like being outside by a stream, but not. No, surrounded by cold, by metal, by manmade objects, the work of human hands, a faint shadow of the glory of the outdoors.

The photos, too, were just shadows of the lives that had flitted in front of the lens and been captured in a second onto silver gelatin. But the images would stay forever. My friends would always be captured at seventeen, ghostly, frozen in this moment of life, long after they had aged or were buried deep in the ground.

I was enlarging a photo of Angela, caught in a rare, natural smile, trying to decide which filter to use for the print. Did I want more or less contrast? How long to expose the photographic paper to the enlarger light? I carried the paper by its corners to the long sinks by the wall where the trays of developer and fixer patiently waited. This was the magic part. You had a white sheet of paper, and you would drop it into a pool of strange-smelling chemicals, count slowly while tilting the pan, and then the crystals would shift and fade or darken, the paper somehow remembering where the light had touched its face. And there was Angela's smile, giving out warmth and brightness even in the dim light and cold air of the darkroom.

"That's beautiful," someone said, and I jumped, dropping my tongs.

I turned around and saw Edward at my shoulder. Jeez, that boy could sneak up on you. It would have been creepy if he weren't so damn hot. "Oh, hey," I said. "I didn't know you were there."

"You're here a lot," he said. "More than you used to be."

I shrugged. "I like to be alone here, keep myself busy. It takes my mind off … things." I made a vague gesture with my hand.

"You used to spend time with your friends."

"Yeah," I said in a small voice, looking at Angela's face floating in the pool of fixer. "That was before…" I let my voice trail off.

"Before they found out," he finished for me. I nodded. "They treat you differently now?"

I laughed humorlessly. "You could say that." Goddamn it, I wasn't going to cry.

"Why?"

"Why what?" I asked, stalling.

"Why do they treat you differently? You're still the same person, aren't you?"

"Well, _yeah_. I guess dying isn't 'in' this year," I joked, trying to keep a light face on things. But then it all came spilling out in a tidal wave of bitterness. "God, I just want things back to normal. I mean, _I'm_ not normal, but why do they have to treat me like I'm already dead?" It was too late. I was crying. My hands were covered in chemicals, so I didn't dare try to wipe my tears away.

"Here," he said, taking a handkerchief out of his pocket and dabbing at my face.

"You … carry a handkerchief?" I asked, trying to keep my breathing regular while he touched my cheeks with the square of clean cotton.

"Doesn't everyone?" he asked, puzzled.

I barked a laugh, which echoed against the bare, cold walls of the room and surprised even me. "No, not so much."

"Oh." He tucked the handkerchief away, a little embarrassed. He turned and left abruptly.

_What the hell was that_? I thought. He'd never said three words to me before.

It was often just the two of us in the darkroom during lunch and after school. My fingers were constantly numb from the chemicals or maybe the disease. I liked to blame the chemicals, because then I could at least pretend to be normal. The weirdness in my body had a real, tangible, non-disease-related cause. He talked to me a little every day, and I found having a disease made me less self-conscious about everything else. What did I care what Edward Cullen thought of me, since I was dying anyway? It's not as though he'd want to get involved with a girl who was already beginning to fade, like a Polaroid in reverse. Soon I would disappear completely.

When that happened, would I fade to light or fade to black?

Sometimes we talked—about photography, technique, shutter speed, whatever. He liked my camera. "That's an amazing little Leica," he said. "I haven't seen one like that since …" He stopped himself and shook his head.

"Why are you always in here?" I asked.

"I don't like being around a lot of people at once. It's too … noisy."

"Do you have, like, super-sensitive ears?"

He chuckled. "You could say that."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

And then we'd sit in silence some more.

I liked having him there. I noticed he watched me when he thought I wasn't looking. My peripheral vision was pretty good though. I liked being watched by him, especially when everyone else tried so hard _not_ to look at me. At least I existed to him. I wasn't dead yet.

He was flipping through a stack of my 8x10 enlargements. "You're not in any of these," he said.

"Well, how can I be? I don't have a shutter release, and my arms aren't nearly long enough to point the camera at myself."

"There should be photos of you."

"Why?" I looked at him, feeling betrayed. "Because I won't be here someday?" He was supposed to treat me normally, like I wasn't dying.

He grimaced. "No," he said slowly. "You're just … I don't know. Never mind."

"I'm just _what_?" I asked, my heart hopeful.

"Nothing," he shrugged, and he left the room again. He was always doing that, wandering in and out of our conversations and the darkroom like an indecisive cat.

It was a rare, sunny day, and I decided not to be in the darkroom for once. I sat outside on one of the picnic tables, leaning back on the heels of my hands, tilting my face to the sun. I remembered my dream about the blinding light, the face of God, the nearly unbearable bliss. I could hear my friends running and shouting, throwing a Frisbee. I wasn't part of it. I wasn't part of their world anymore. I existed on my island of picnic table, drinking in the sunshine.

I didn't see Edward that day. Maybe he was out sick.

After school, I went back to the darkroom, hoping to see him, but he hadn't been in school, so it wasn't likely that he'd be here. And he wasn't. I made some prints and sat in the lit section of the darkroom, waiting for my pictures to be rinsed out. If you didn't rinse the prints long enough, over time they'd turn smudgy, contaminated with chemicals. I was feeling a little dizzy, maybe a little more than normal. I chalked it up to not eating much that day. I always had a concrete, normal-girl reason for the things that were happening in my body. I didn't want to acknowledge the disease. It was not doing anything to me. If I didn't acknowledge it, it wouldn't ravage my body. I'd force it to be imaginary.

It was dark outside by the time my prints were rinsed and dry, and I carried the stack with me out to the almost-empty parking lot. I didn't feel right. My knees felt like jelly, and my feet were weirdly numb. The last thing I remembered was falling. It happened in such slow motion that I was sure I could stop it, but my body had relinquished control of my muscles. I felt a sharp pain at the back of my head, then fluid warm and wet on my scalp, and then nothing at all.

I thought it would hurt more, but it was peaceful, kind of lovely. I was in my body, and I wasn't. And there it was, the most wonderful light, more golden than sunshine, warmer than flame. _It's so beautiful_, I thought, no longer aware of limbs or breathing or heartbeat.

_She's lost too much blood_, I thought I heard someone say. I wanted to hush the person. This light was sacred. There should be no talking.

_You have to decide now, Edward_, the voice said.

_Edward? _I thought. _What does he have to do with this?_ Maybe it wasn't the same Edward at all. It was a common enough name.

_Please_, I heard someone say, someone with a voice like an angel. _Please_, the angel begged. Then a sharp intake of breath. _But do you think it's what she would want?_

Who were they talking about? I wanted to run into the light, except I had no legs. I couldn't see anything _but_ light.

_You love her, don't you?_ the first voice said. _What does your heart say?_

_My heart? My heart is dead_, said the angel.

_Love_. The word echoed in my head, and I wanted to wrap my arms around the light, my arms which now were as big as a universe, deeper than the sea. _Love_, I tried to say.

_Did she say something?_ asked the angel.

_It has to be now_, the first voice said.

I heard something like a sob, but I couldn't see. _What was his answer?_ I wondered, but then I felt searing pain, hotter than flame, but not like the light I had been bathing in. My arms were no longer as large as a universe, deeper than the sea. I was shrinking, frail, burning, consumed.

_Where is my light?_ I thought. _Don't take it away_, I whimpered to myself. _Please. I lost you once already_, I thought, remembering my beautiful dream. I would have wept for the loss of the light, except I didn't know how to do that anymore.

***

_She's waking up_, I heard someone say.

"Thirsty," I said, swallowing a few times. I felt heavy again, _contained_. I could feel a body—my body—again. My eyelids felt like stone as I tried to open them. The light was so bright, so many colors at once. I'd never seen so many colors, at least not as intense as this.

_She's here_, said the angel from my dream.

It took a while for my eyes to adjust to this new world of brightness, vivid color, the noise of molecules shifting and stretching. And then I saw him.

"Edward?" I asked.

"Hi," he said, shy and looking at his feet. He turned away and said, "Carlisle, she's awake. She's okay." His face crumpled up, and he shook as if he were crying.

"Are you my angel?" I asked.

"I don't know," he said, still unable to look at me. "Here," he said, shoving some papers at me.

They were photographs—photographs of _me_. I was sitting on a picnic bench, leaning back and facing the sun.

"This … is me," I said.

"Yeah."

"You once said there should be photographs of me, didn't you?" That other life was hazy now, but this memory felt true. "Did you take these?"

"I did," he whispered, ashamed.

"Why? You never told me. You were going to, but then you stopped." I remembered that much.

"I … I wanted to say, because you are so beautiful."

"Oh," I said, not knowing where to look. "I don't really see it," I said, handing the pictures back, shaking my head.

"You're my sun," he said, touching my cheek.

"Oh," I said. "Say that again." I closed my eyes so I could focus on his voice alone.

"You're my sun," he repeated, and then I knew for certain.

He was my angel.

* * *

**A/N: STICK A FORK IN ME; I'M DONE.**


End file.
